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THE 


GREAT WAR SYNDICATE 


BY 



FRANK R. STOCKTON 


Author of “ The Lady or the Tiger'' “ Rudder Grange'* 
“ The Casting Away of Mrs. Leeks and Mrs, 
Aleshinef “ What Might Have Been 
Expected^" etc., etc. 



NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 




?Z3 

.Sbui 

Gl-W! 


Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1889, by 
P. F. COLLIER, 

in the office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C. 


To replace lost copy 
JUL 2 4 1930 


rBXSS 07 


BOSTON 


THE 


GEEAT WAE SYNDICATE. 


In the spring of a certain year, not far 
from the close of the nineteenth century, 
when the political relations between the 
United States and Great Britain became 
so strained that careful observers on both 
sides of the Atlantic were forced to the 
belief that a serious break in these rela- 
tions might be looked for at any time, the 
fishing schooner “ Eliza Drum ” sailed 
from a port in Maine for the banks of 
N e wf oundland. 

It was in this year that a new system of 
protection for American fishing vessels liad 
been adopted in Washington. Every fleet 
of these vessels was accompanied by one 
or more United States cruisers, which re- 
mained on the fishing grounds, not only 
for the purpose of warning unwary Ameri- 
can craft who might approach too near the 
three-mile limit, but also to overlook the 


4 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

action of the British naval vessels on the 
coast, and to interfere, at least by protest, ' 
with such seizures of American fishing 
boats as might appear to be unjust. In 
the opinion of all persons of sober judg- 
ment, there was nothing in the condition 
of affairs at this time so dangerous to the 
peace of the two countries as the presence 
of these American cruisers in the fishing 
waters. 

The “ Eliza Drum ” was late in her arri 
val on the fishing grounds, and having, 
under orders from Wasliington, reported 
to the commander of the ‘‘ Lennehaha,” 
the United States vessel in charge at that 
place, her captain and crew went vigorous- 
ly to work to make up for lost time. They 
worked so vigorously, and with eyes so sin- 
gle to the catching of fish, that on the 
morning of the day after their arrival, they 
were hauling up cod at a point which, ac- 
cording to the nationabty of the calcula- 
tor, might be two and three-quarters or 
three and one-quarter miles from the 
Canadian coast. 

In consequence of this inattention to 
the apparent extent of the marine mile, 
the “Eliza Drum,” a little before noon, 
was overhauled and seized by the British 


THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 5 


cruiser, “Dog Star.” A few miles away 
the “ Lennehaha ” had perceived the dan- 
gerous position of the “ Eliza Drum,” and 
had started toward her to warn her to take 
a less doubtful position. But before she 
arrived the capture had taken place. 
When he reached the spot where the 
“ Eliza Drum ” had been fishing, the com- 
mander of the “ Lennehaha ” made an obser- 
vation of the distance from the shore, and 
calculated it to be more than three miles. 
When he sent an officer in a boat to the 
“Dog Star ” to state the result of his com- 
putations, the captain of the British vessel 
replied that he was satisfied the distance 
was less than three miles, and that he was 
now about to take the “ Eliza Drum ” into 
port. 

On receiving this information, the com- 
mander of the “Lennehaha” steamed 
closer to the “ Dog Star,” and informed 
her captain, by means of a speaking- 
trumpet, that if he took the “ Eliza Drum ” 
into a Canadian port, he would first have 
to sail over his ship. To this the captain 
of the “ Dog Star ” replied that he did not 
in the least object to sail over the “ Len- 
nehaha,” and proceeded to put a prize 
crew on board the fishing vessel. 


6 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


At this juncture the captain of the 
“ Eliza Drum ” ran up a large American 
flag ; in flve minutes afterward the captain 
of the prize crew hauled it down ; in less 
than ten minutes after this the “ Lenne- 
haha ” and the “ Dog Star ” were blazing 
at each other with their bow guns. The 
spark had been struck. 

The contest was not a long one. The 
“Dog Star” was of much greater tonnage 
and heavier armament than her antagonist, 
and early in the afternoon she steamed for 
St. John’s, taking with her as prizes both 
the “Eliza Drum” and the “ Lennehaha.” 

All that night, at every point in the 
United States which was reached by tele- 
graph, there burned a smothered fire ; and 
the next morning, when the regular and 
extra editions of the newspapers were 
poured out upon the land, the fire burst 
into a roaring blaze. From lakes to gulf, 
from ocean to ocean, on mountain and 
plain, in city and prairie, it roared and 
blazed. Parties, sections, politics, were all 
forgotten. Every American formed part 
of an electric system ; the same fire flashed 
into every soul. No matter what might 
be thought on the morrow, or in the com- 
ing days which might bring better under- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 7 


standing, this day the unreasoning fire 
blazed and roared. 

With morning newspapers in their 
hands, men rushed from the breakfast- 
tables into the streets to meet their fellow- 
men. What was it that they should do ? 

Detailed accounts of the affair came 
rapidly, but there was nothing in them to 
quiet the national indignation ; the Amer- 
ican flag had been hauled down by Eng- 
lishmen, an American naval vessel had 
been fired into and captured; that was 
enough! No matter whether the “Eliza 
Drum ” was within the three-mile limit or 
not ! No matter which vessel fired first ! 
If it were the “Lennehaha,” the more 
honour to her ; she ought to have done it I 
From platform, pulpit, stump, and editorial 
office came one vehement, passionate shout 
directed toward Washington. 

Congress was in session, and in its halls 
the fire roared louder and blazed higher 
than on mountain or plain, in city or 
prairie. No member of the Government, 
from President to page, ventured to oppose 
the tempestuous demands of the people. 
The day for argument upon the exciting 
question had been a long and weary one, 
and it had gone by. In less than a week 


8 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the great shout of the people was answered 
by a declaration of war against Great 
Britain. 

When this had been done, those who 
demanded war breathed easier, but those 
who must direct the war breathed harder. 

It was indeed a time for hard breathing, 
but the great mass of the people perceived 
no reason why this should be. Money 
there was in vast abundance. In every 
State well-drilled men, by thousands, stood 
ready for the word to march, and the mili- 
tary experience and knowledge given by a 
great war was yet strong upon the nation. 

To the people at large the plan of the 
war appeared a very obvious and a very 
simple one. Canada had given the 
offence, Canada should be made to pay 
the penalty. In a very short time, one 
hundred thousand, two hundred thousand, 
five hundred thousand men, if necessar}^ 
could be made ready for the invasion of 
Canada. From platform, pulpit, stump, 
and editorial office came the cry : — 

“ On to Canada ! ” 

At the seat of Government, however, 
the jjlan of the war did not appear so 
obvious, so simple. Throwing a great 
army into Canada was all well enough. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 9 


and that army would probably do well 
enough ; but the question which produced 
hard breathing in the executive branch of 
the Government was the immediate pro- 
tection of the sea-coast, Atlantic, Gulf, and 
even Pacific. 

In a storm of national indignation war 
had been declared against a power which 
at this period of her history had brought 
up her naval forces to a point double in 
strength to that of any other country in 
the world. And this war had been de- 
clared by a nation which, comparatively 
speaking, possessed no naval strength at 
all. 

For some years the United States navy 
had been steadily improving, but this im- 
provement was not sufficient to make it 
worthy of reliance at this crisis. As has 
been said, there was money enough, and 
every ship-yard in the country could be set 
to work to build ironclad men-of-war : but 
it takes a long time to build ships, and 
England’s navy was afloat. It was the 
British keel that America had to fear. 

By means of the continental cables it 
was known that many of the largest mail 
vessels of the British transatlantic lines, 
which had been withdrawn upon the 


10 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


declaration of war, were preparing in 
British ports to transport troops to Can- 
ada. It was not impossible that these 
great steamers might land an army in 
Canada before an American army could 
be organized and marched to that province. 
It might be that the United States would 
be forced to defend her borders, instead of 
invading those of the enemy. 

In every fort and navy-yard all was 
activity ; the hammering of iron went on 
by day and by night ; but what was to be 
done when the great ironclads of England 
hammered upon our defences ? How long 
would it be before the American flag 
would be seen no more upon the high 
seas? 

It is not surprising that the Government 
found its position one of perilous responsi- 
bility. A wrathful nation expected of it 
more than it could perform. 

All over the country, however, there 
were thoughtful men, not connected with 
the Government, who saw the perilous 
features of the situation ; and day by day 
these grew less afraid of being considered 
traitors, and more willing to declare their 
convictions of the country’s danger. 
Despite the continuance of the national 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 11 


enthusiasm, doubts, perplexities, and fears 
began to show themselves. 

In the States bordering upon Canada a 
reactionary feeling became evident. Unless 
the United States navy could prevent 
England from rapidly pouring into Canada, 
not only her own troops, but perhaps those 
of allied nations, these Northern States 
might become the scene of warfare, and 
whatever the issue of the contest, their 
lands might be ravished, their people 
suffer. 

From many quarters urgent demands 
were now pressed upon the Government. 
From the interior there were clamours for 
troops to be massed on the Northern fron- 
tier, and from the seaboard cities there 
came a cry for ships that were worthy to 
be called men-of-war, — ships to defend the 
harbours and bays, ships to repel an inva- 
sion by sea. Suggestions were innumer- 
able. There was no time to build, it was 
urged; the Government could call upon 
friendly nations. But wise men smiled 
sadly at these suggestions ; it was difficult 
to find a nation desirous of a war with 
England. 

In the midst of the enthusiasms, the 
fears, and the suggestions, came reports of 


12 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the capture of American merchantmen by 
fast British cruisers. These reports made 
the American people more furious, the 
American Government more anxious. 

Almost from the beginning of this period 
of national turmoil, a party of gentlemen 
met daily in one of the large rooms in a 
hotel in New York. At first there were 
eleven of these men, all from the great 
Atlantic cities, but their number increased 
by arrivals from other parts of the country, 
until at last they numbered twenty-three. 
These gentlemen were all great capitalists, 
and accustomed to occupying themselves 
with great enterprises. By day and by 
night they met together with closed doors, 
until they had matured the scheme which 
they had been considering. As soon as 
this work was done, a committee was sent 
to Washington, to submit a plan to the 
Government. 

These twenty-three men had formed 
themselves into a Syndicate, with the 
object of taking entira charge of the war 
between the United States and Great 
Britain. 

This proposition was an astounding one, 
but the Government was obliged to treat 
it with respectful consideration. The 


THE GREAT SYNDICATE. 13 


men who offered it were a power in the 
land, — a power which no government 
could afford to disregard. 

The plan of the Syndicate was compre- 
hensive, direct, and simple. It offered to 
assume the entire control and expense of 
the war, and to effect a satisfactory peace 
within one year. As a guarantee that this 
contract would be properly performed, an 
immense sum of money would be deposited 
-^in the Treasury at Washington. Should 
the Syndicate be unsuccessful, this sum 
would be forfeited, and it would receive 
no pay for anything it had done. 

The sum to be paid by the Government 
to the Syndicate, should it bring the war 
to a satisfactory conclusion, would depend 
upon the duration of hostilities. That is 
to say, that as the shorter the duration of 
the war, the greater would be the benefit 
to the country, therefore, the larger must 
be the pay to the Syndicate. According 
to the proposed contract, the Syndicate 
would receive, if the war should continue 
for a year, one-quarter the sum stipulated 
to be paid if peace should be declared in 
three months. 

If at any time during the conduct of the 
war by the Syndicate an American seaport 


14 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 

sliould be taken by the enemy, or a Brit- 
ish force landed on any point of the sea- 
coast, the contract should be considered at 
an end, and security and payment for- 
feited. If any point on the northern 
boundary of the United States should be 
taken and occupied by the enemy, one 
million dollars of the deposited security 
should be forfeited for every such occupa- 
tion, but the contract should continue. 

It was stipulated that the land and 
naval forces of the United States should 
remain under the entire control of the 
Government, but should be maintained as 
a defensive force, and not brought into 
action unless any failure on the part of 
the Syndicate should render such action 
necessary. 

The state of feeling in governmental 
circles, and the evidences of alarm and dis- 
trust which were becoming apparent in 
Congress and among the people, exerted 
an important influence in favour of the 
Syndicate. The Government caught at 
its proposition, not as if it were a straw, 
but as if it were a life- raft. The men who 
offered to relieve the executive depart- 
ments of their perilous responsibilities 
were men of great ability, prominent posi- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 15 


tions, and vast resources, whose vast en- 
terprises had already made them known 
all over the globe. Such men were not 
likely to jeopardize their reputations and 
fortunes in a case like this, unless they 
had well-founded reasons for believing 
that they would be successful. Even the 
largest amount stipulated to be paid them 
in case of success would be less than the 
ordinary estimates for the military and 
naval operations which had been antici- 
pated ; and in case of failure, the amount 
forfeited would go far to repair the losses 
which might be sustained by the citizens 
of the various States. 

At all events, should the Syndicate be 
allowed to take immediate control of the 
war, there would be time to put the army 
and navy, especially the latter, in better 
condition to carry on the contest in case 
of the failure of the Syndicate. Organiza- 
tion and construction might still go on, 
and, should it be necessary, the army and 
navy could step into the contest fresh and 
well prepared. 

All branches of the Government united 
in accepting the offer of the Syndicate. 
The contract was signed, and the world 
waited to see what would happen next. 


16 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

Tlie influence which for years had been 
exerted by the interests controlled by the 
men composing the Syndicate, had its ef- 
fect in producing a popular confidence in 
the power of the members of the Syndicate 
to conduct a war as successfully as they 
had conducted other gigantic enterprises. 
Therefore, although predictions of disaster 
came from many quarters, the American 
public appeared willing to wait with but 
moderate impatience for the result of this 
novel undertaking. 

The Government now proceeded to mass 
troops at important points on the northern 
frontier ; forts were supplied with men 
and armaments, all coast defences were 
put in the best possible condition, the 
navy was stationed at important ports, 
and work at the ship-yards went on. But 
without reference to all this, the work of 
the Syndicate immediately began. 

This body of men were of various poli- 
tics and of various pursuits in life. But 
politics were no more regarded in the 
work they had undertaken than they 
would have been in the purchase of land 
or of railroad iron. No manifestoes of 
motives and intentions were issued to the 
public. The Syndicate simply went to 


THE GllEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 17 


work. There could be no doubt that early 
success would be a direct profit to it, but 
there could also be no doubt that its suc- 
cess would be a vast benefit and profit, not 
only to the business enterprises in which 
these men were severally engaged, but to 
the business of the whole country. To 
save the United States from a dragging 
war, and to save themselves from the ef- 
fects of it, were the prompting motives for 
the formation of the Syndicate. 

Without hesitation, the Syndicate deter- 
mined that the war in which it was about 
to engage should be one of defence by 
means of offence. Such a war must neces- 
sarily be quick and effective ; and with all 
the force of their fortunes, their minds, 
and theii- bodies, its members went to work 
to wage this war quickly and effectively. 

All known inventions and improvements 
in the art of war had been thoroughly 
considered by the Syndicate, and by the 
eminent specialists whom it had enlisted 
in its service. Certain recently perfected 
engines of war, novel in nature, were the 
exclusive property of the Syndicate. It 
was known, or surmised, in certain quar- 
ters that the Syndicate had secured posses- 
sion of important warlike inventions ; but 


18 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


wliat they were and how they acted was a 
secret carefully guarded and protected. 

The first step of the Syndicate was to 
purchase from the United States Govern- 
ment ten war-vessels. These were of me- 
dium size and in good condition, but they 
were of an old-fashioned type, and it had 
not been considered expedient to put them 
in commission. This action caused sur- 
prise and disappointment in many quar- 
ters. ■ It had been supposed that the 
Syndicate, through its agents scattered 
all over the world, would immediately 
acquire, by purchase or lease, a fleet of fine 
ironclads culled from various maritime 
powers. But the Syndicate having no 
intention of involving, or attempting to 
involve, other countries in this quarrel, 
paid no attention to public opinion, and 
went to work in its own way. 

Its vessels, eight of which were on the 
Atlantic coast and two on the Pacific, were 
rapidly prepared for the peculiar service in 
which they were to be engaged. The re- 
sources of the Syndicate were great, and 
in a very short time several of their ves- 
sels, already heavily plated with steel, 
were furnished with an additional outside 
ai'mour, formed of strips of elastic steel, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 19 


each reaching from the gunwales nearly 
to the surface of the water. These strips, 
about a foot wide, and placed an inch or 
two apart, were each backed by several 
powerful air-buffers, so that a ball striking 



Sectional Vie^ of Side of Repeller No. 1. 

A, spring-tempered bars; b, air-buffers; c, iron deck; d, teak 
lining; £, teak braces. 


one or more of them would be deprived of 
much of its momentum. The experiments 
upon the steel spring and buffers adojpted 
by the Syndicate showed that the force of 
the heaviest cannonading was almost dead- 
ened by the powerful elasticity of this 
armoui‘. 


20 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


The armament of each vessel consisted 
of but one gun, of large calibre, placed on 
the forward deck, and protected by a bomb- 
proof covering. Each vessel was manned 
by a captain and crew from the merchant 
service, from whom no warlike duties were 
expected. The fighting operations were 
in charge of a small body of men, com- 
posed of two or three scientific specialists, 
and some practical gunners and their 
assistants. A few bomb-proof canopies 
and a curved steel deck completed the 
defences of the vessel. 

Besides equipping this little navy, the 
Syndicate set about the construction of 
certain sea-going vessels of an extraordi- 
nary kind. So great were the facilities at 
its command, and so thorough and com- 
plete its methods, that ten or a dozen 
ship-yards and foundries were set to work 
simultaneously to build one of these ships. 
In a marvellously short time the Syndicate 
possessed several of them ready for action. 

These vessels became technically known 
as “ crabs.” They were not large, and the 
only part of them which projected above the 
water was the middle of an elliptical deck, 
slightly convex, and heavily mailed with 
ribs of steel. These vessels were fitted 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 21 


with electric engines of extraordinary 
power, and were capable of great speed. 
At their bows, fully protected by the over- 
hanging deck, was the machinery by which 
their peculiar work was to be accomplished. 
The Syndicate intended to confine itself to 
marine operations, and for the present it 
was contented with these two classes of 
vessels. 



Sectional View op Repelleu’s Bow, showing 
A, gigantic gun used in projecting the instantaneous motor*, 
BB, incline elevator used in loading gun; c, loading chamber; 
D, bomb-proof hood to gun. 

The armament for each of the large 
vessels, as has been said before, consisted of 
a single gun of long range, and the ammu- 
nition was confined entirely to a new style 
of projectile, which had never yet been 
used in warfare. The material and com 
struction of this projectile were known 
only to three members of the Syndicate, 
who had invented and perfected it, and it 
was on account of their possession of this 


22 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


secret that they had been invited to join 
that body. 

This projectile was not, in the ordinary 
sense of the word, an explosive, and was 
named by its inventors, “ The Instan- 
taneous Motor.” It was discharged from 
an ordinary cannon, but no gunpowder or 
other explosive compound was used to 
propel it. The bomb possessed in itself 
the necessary power of propulsion, and the 
gun was used merely to give it the proper 
direction. 

These bombs were cylindrical in form, 
and pointed at the outer end. They were 
filled with hundreds of small tubes, each 
radiating outward from a central line. 
Those in the middle third of the bomb 
pointed directly outward, while those in 
its front portion were inclined forward at 
a slight angle, and those in the rear portion 
backward at the same angle. One tube at 
the end of the bomb, and pointing directly 
backward, furnished the motive power. 

Each of these tubes could exert a force 
sufficient to move an ordinary train of pas- 
senger cars one mile, and this power could 
be exerted instantaneously, so that the dif- 
ference in time in the starting of a train 
at one end of the mile and its arrival at the 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 23 

other would not be appreciable. The dif- 
ference in concussionary force between a 
train moving at the rate of a mile in two 
minutes, or even one minute, and another 
train which moves a mile in an instant, can 
easily be imagined. 

In these bombs, those tubes which might 
direct their powers downward or laterally 
upon the earth were capable of instanta- 
neously propelling every portion of solid 
ground or rock to a distance of two or 
three hundred yards, while the particles of 
objects on the surface of the earth were in- 
stantaneously removed to a far greater dis- 
tance. The tube which propelled the bomb 
was of a force graduated according to cir- 
cumstances, and it would carry a bomb to 
as great a distance as accurate observation 
for purposes of aim could be made. Its 
force was brought into action while in the 
cannon by means of electricity, while the 
same effect was produced in the other tubes 
by the concussion of the steel head against 
the object aimed at. 

What gave the tubes their power was 
the jealously guarded secret. 

The method of aiming was as novel as 
the bomb itself. In this process nothing 
depended on the eyesight of the gunner; 


24 THE GREAT TlOli? SYNDICATE. 


the personal equation was entirely elimi- 
nated. The gun was so mounted that its 
direction was accurately indicated by grad- 
uated scales ; there Avas an instrument 
Avhich was acted upon by the dip, rise, or 
roll of the vessel, and which showed at 
any moment the position of the gun with 
reference to the plane of the sea-surface. 

Before the discharge of the cannon an 
observation was taken by one of the scien- 
tific men, which accurately determined the 
distance to the object to be aimed at, and 
reference to a carefully prepared mathe- 
matical table showed to what points on 
the graduated scales the gun should be ad- 
justed; and the instant that the muzzle of 
the cannon was in the position that it was 
when the observation was taken, a button 
was touched and the bomb was instanta- 
neously placed on the spot aimed at. The 
exactness with which the propelling force 
of the bomb could be determined Avas an 
important factor in this method of aiming. 

As soon as three of the spring-armoured 
vessels and five “ crabs ” were completed, 
the Syndicate felt itself ready to begin op- 
erations. It was indeed time. The seas 
had been covered with American and 
British merchantmen hastening homeward, 


TUB GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 25 

or to friendly ports, before the actual com- 
mencement of hostilities. But all had not 
been fortunate enough to reach safety 
within the limits of time allowed, and sev- 
eral American merchantmen had been al- 
ready captured by fast British cruisers. 

The members of the Syndicate well un- 
derstood that if a war was to be carried on 
as they desired, they must strike the first 
real blow. Comparatively speaking, a very 
short time had elapsed since the declara- 
tion of war, and the opportunity to take 
the initiative was still open. 

It was in order to take this initiative 
that, in the early hours of a July morning, 
two of the Syndicate’s armoured vessels, 
each accompanied by a crab, steamed out 
of a New England port, and headed for the 
point on the Canadian coast where it had 
been decided to open the campaign. 

The vessels of the Syndicate had no 
individual names. The spring-armoured 
ships were termed “repellers,” and were, 
numbered, and the crabs were known by 
the letters of the alphabet. Each repeller 
was in charge of a Director of Naval Oper- 
ations; and the whole naval force of the 
Syndicate was under the command of a 
Director-in-chief. On this momentous oc- 


23 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 


casion tins officer was on board of Repeller 
No. 1, and commanded the little fleet. 

The repellers had never been vessels of 
great speed, and their present armour of 
steel strips, the lower portion of which was 
frequently under water, considerably re- 
tarded their progress; but each of them 
was taken in tow by one of the swift and 
powerful crabs, and with this assistance 
they made very good time, reaching their 
destination on the morning of the second 
day. 

It was on a breezy day, with a cloudy 
sky, and the sea moderately smooth, that 
the little fleet of the Syndicate lay to offi 
the harbour of one of the principal Cana- 
dian seaports. About five miles away the 
headlands on either side of the mouth of 
the harbour could be plainly seen. It had 
been decided that Repeller No. 1 should 
begin operations. Accordingly, that ves- 
sel steamed about a mile nearer the har- 
bour, accompanied by Crab A. The other 
repeller and crab remained in their first 
position, ready to act in case they should 
be needed. 

The approach of two vessels, evidently 
men-of-war, and carrying the American 
flag, was perceived from the forts and re- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 27 


doubts at the mouth of the harbour, and 
the news quickly spread to the city and to 
the vessels in port. Intense excitement 
ensued on land and water, among the citi- 
zens of the place as well as its defenders. 
Every man who had a post of duty was in- 
stantly at it; and in less than half an hour 
the British man-of-war “ Scarabseus,” which 
had been lying at anchor a short distance 
outside the harbour, came steaming out to 
meet the enemy. There were other naval 
vessels in port, but they required more 
time to be put in readiness for action. 

As soon as the approach of “Scara- 
baeus ” was perceived by Bepeller No. 1, a 
boat bearing a white flag was lowered from 
that vessel and was rapidly rowed toward 
the British ship. When the latter saw the 
boat coming she lay to, and waited its arri- 
val. A note was delivered to the captain 
of the “ Scarabseus,” in which it was stated 
that the Syndicate, which had undertaken 
on the part of the United States the con- 
duct of the war between that country and 
Great Britain, was now prepared to de- 
mand the surrender of this city with its 
forts and defences and all vessels within 
its harbour, and, as a first step, the im- 
mediate surrender of the vessel to the 


28 THE GEE AT WAE SYNDICATE. 


commander of which this note was deliv- 
ered. 

The overwhelming effrontery of this 
demand caused the commander of the 
“ Scarabaeus ” to doubt whether he had to 
deal with a raving lunatic or a blustering 
fool ; but he informed the person in charge 
of the flag-of-truce boat, that he would 
give him fifteen minutes in which to get 
back to his vessel, and that he would then 
open fire upon that craft. 

The men who rowed the little boat were 
not men-of-war’s men, and were unaccus- 
tomed to duties of this kind. In eight 
minutes they had reached their vessel, and 
were safe on board. 

Just seven minutes afterward the first 
shot came from the “ Scarabseus.” It 
passed over Eepeller No. 1, and that ves- 
sel, instead of replying, immediately 
steamed nearer her adversary. The Direc- 
tor-in-chief desired to determine the effect 
of an active cannonade upon the new 
armour, and therefore ordered the vessel 
placed ill such a position that the English- 
man might have the best opportunity for 
using it as a target. 

The “ Scarabseus ” lost no time in avail- 
ing herself of the facilities offered. She 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 29 


was a large and powerful ship, with a 
heavy armament ; and, soon getting the 
range of the Syndicate’s vessel, she hurled 
ball after ball upon her striped side. Re- 
peller No. 1 made no reply, but quietly 
submitted to the terrible bombardment. 
Some of the great shot jarred her from 
bow to stern, but not one of them broke a 
steel spring, nor penetrated the heavy 
inside plates. 

After half an hour of this work the Di- 
rector-in-chief became satisfied that the new 
armour had well acquitted itself in the se- 
vere trial to which it had been subjected. 
Some of the air-buffers had been disabled, 
probably on account of faults in their con- 
struction, but these could readily be re- 
placed, and no further injury had been 
done the vessel. It was not necessary, 
therefore, to continue the experiment any 
longer, and besides, there was danger that 
the Englishman, perceiving that his antag- 
onist did not appear to be affected by his 
fire, would approach closer and endeavour 
to ram her. This was to be avoided, for 
the “ Scarabaeus ” was a much larger ves- 
sel than Rej^eller No. 1, and able to run 
into the latter and sink her by mere pre- 
ponderance of weight. 


30 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 


It was therefore decided to now test 
the powers of the crabs. Signals were 
made from Repeller No. 1 to Crab A, 




Mode op Signalling with Black Smoke. 

which had been lying with the larger ves- 
sel between it and the enemy. These 
signals were made by jets of dense black 
smoke, which were ejected frnm a small 
pipe on the repeller.- These slender columns 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 31 


of smoke preserved their cylindrical forms 
for some moments, and were visible at a 
great distance by day or night, being il- 
lumined in the latter case by electric light. 
The length and frequency of these jets 
were regulated by an instrument in the Di- 
rector’s room. Thus, by means of long and 
short puffs, with the proper use of inter- 
vals, a message could be projected into the 
air as a telegraphic instrument would mark 
it upon paper. 

In this manner Crab A was ordered to 
immediately proceed to the attack of the 
“ Scaraboeus.” The almost submerged ves- 
sel steamed rapidly from behind her con- 
sort, and made for the British man-of- 
war. 

When the latter vessel perceived the 
approach of this turtle-backed object, 
squirting little jets of black smoke as she 
replied to the orders from the repeller, 
there was great amazement on board. The 
crabi had not been seen before, but as it 
came rapidly on there was no time for 
curiosity or discussion, and several heavy 
guns were brought to bear upon it. It 
was difficult to hit a rapidly moving Hat 
object scarcely above the surface of the 
water ; and although., several shot -struck 


82 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


the crab, they glanced off without in the 
least interfering with its progress. 

Crab A soon came so near the “Scarabseus” 
that it was impossible to depress the guns 
of the latter so as to strike her. The great 
vessel was, therefore, headed toward its as- 
sailant, and under a full head of steam 
dashed directly at' it to run it down. But 
the crab could turn as upon a pivot, and 
shooting to one side allowed the surging 
man-of-war to pass it. 

Perceiving instantly that it would be 
difficult to strike this nimble and almost 
submerged adversary, the commander of 
the “ Scarabjeus ” thought it well to let it 
alone for the present, and to bear down 
with all speed upon the repeller. But it 
was easier to hit the crab than to leave it 
behind. It was capable of great speed, 
and, following the British vessel, it quickly 
came up with her. 

The course of the “ Scarabseus ” was in- 
stantly changed, and every effort was 
made to get the vessel into a position to 
run down the crab. But this was not easy 
for so large a ship, and Crab A seemed to 
have no difficulty in keeping close to- her 
stern. 

Several machine-guns, especially adapted 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 33 


for firing at torpedo-boats or any hostile 
craft which might be discovered close to a 
vessel, were now brought to bear upon the 
crab, and ball after ball was hurled at her. 
Some of these struck, but glanced off with- 
out penetrating her tough armour. 



Section of Crab A, showing Nippers. 

A, bomb-proof roof; b, water line; c, interior of crab;- D, joint 
of nippers ; E, arms of nippers ; ff, rods of nippers connecting 
with electric engine ; g, teak lining to crab. 

These manoeuvres had not continued 
long, when the crew of the crab was ready 
to bring into action the peculiar apparatus 
of that peculiar craft. An enormous pair 
of iron forceps, each massive limb of which 
measured twelve feet or more in length, 
was run out in front of the crab at a depth 


84 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


of six or eight feet below the surface. 
These forceps were acted upon by an elec- 
tric engine of immense power, by which 
they could be shut, opened, projected, with- 
drawn, or turned and twisted. 

The crab darted forward, and in the next 
instant the great teeth of her pincers were 
fastened with a tremendous grip upon the 
rudder and rudder-post of the “Scara- 
bacus.” 

Then followed a sudden twist, which 
sent a thrill through both vessels ; a crash ; 
a backward jerk ; the snapping of a chain ; 
and in a moment the great rudder, with 
half of the rudder-post attached, was torn 
from the vessel, and as the forceps opened 
it dropped to leeward and hung dangling 
by one chain. 

Again the forceps opened wide ; again 
there was a rush ; and this time the huge 
jaws closed upon the rapidly revolving 
screw-propeller. There was a tremendous 
crash, and the small but massive crab 
turned over so far that for an instant one 
of its sides was plainly visible above the 
water. The blades of the propeller were 
crushed and shivered ; those parts of the 
steamer’s engines connecting with the pro- 
peller-shaft were snapped and rent apart, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 85 


while the propeller-shaft itself was broken 
by the violent stoppage. 

The crab, which had quickly righted, 
now backed, still holding the crushed pro- 
peller in its iron grasp, and as it moved 
away from the “ Scarabseus,” it extracted 
about forty feet of its propeller-shaft ; 
then, opening its massive jaws, it allowed 
the useless mass of iron to drop to the bot- 
tom of the sea. 

Every man on board the “ Scarabaeus ” 
was wild with amazement and excitement. 
Few could comprehend what had hap- 
pened, but this very quickly became 
evident. So far as motive power was 
concerned, the “ Scarabseus ” was totally 
disabled. She could not direct her course, 
for her rudder was gone, her propeller was 
gone, her engines were useless, and she 
could do no more than float as wind or tide 
might move her. Moreover, there was a 
jagged hole in her stern where the shaft 
had been, and tlirough this the water was 
pouring into the vessel. As a man-of- 
war the “ Scarabseus ” was worthless. 

Orders now came fast from Repeller No. 
1, which had moved nearer to the scene of 
conflict. It was to be supposed that the 
disabled ship was properly furnished with 


36 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


bulk-heads, so that the water would pene- 
trate no farther than the stern compartment, 
and that, therefore, she was in no danger 
of sinking. Crab A was ordered to make 
fast to the bow of the “ Scarabseus,” and 
tow her toward two men-of-war who were 
rapidly approaching from the harbour. 

This proceeding astonished the com- 
mander and othcers of the “Scarabaeus” 
almost as much as the extraordinary attack 
which had been made upon their ship. 
They had expected a demand to surrender 
and haul down their flag; but the Di- 
rector-in-chief on board Repeller No. 1 was 
of the opinion that with her propeller ex- 
tracted it mattered little what flag she 
flew. His work with the “Scarabaeus” 
was over ; for it had been ordered by the 
Syndicate that its vessels should not en- 
cumber themselves with prizes. 

Towed by the powerful crab, which ap- 
parently had no fear that its disabled 
adversary might fire upon it, the “ Scara- 
baeus” moved toward the harbour, and 
when it had come within a quarter of a 
mile of the foremost British vessel. Crab 
A cast off and steamed back to Repeller 
No. 1. 

The other English vessels soon came up, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 37 


and each lay to and sent a boat to the 
“ Scarabaeus.” After half an hour’s con- 
sultation, in which the amazement of those 
on board the damaged vessel was commu- 
nicated to the officers and crews of her 
two consorts, it was determined that the 
smaller of these should tow the disabled 
ship into port, while the other one, in 
company with a man-of-war just coming 
out of the harbour, should make an attack 
upon Repeller No. 1. 

It had been plainly proved that ordinary 
shot and shell had no effect upon this craft; 
but it had not been proved that she could 
withstand the rams of powerful iron- 
clads. If this vessel, that apparently car- 
ried no guns, or, at least, had used none, 
could be crushed, capsized, sunk, or in any 
way put out of the fight, it was probable 
that the dangerous submerged nautical 
machine would not care to remain in these 
Avaters. If it remained it must be de- 
stroyed by torpedoes. 

Signals were exchanged between the 
two English vessels, and in a very short 
time they Avere steaming toward the repel- 
ler. It Avas a dangerous thing for tAvo ves- 
sels of their size to come close enough 
together for both to ram an enemy at the 


38 ttt:e great war syndicate. 

same time, but it was determined to take 
the risks and do this, if possible ; for the 
destruction of the repeller was obviously 
the first duty in hand. 

As the two men-of-war rapidly approached 
Repeller No. 1, they kept up a steady fire 
upon her ; for if in this way they could 
damage her, the easier would be their task. 
With a firm reliance upon the efficacy of 
the steel-spring armour, the Director-in- 
chief felt no fear of the enemy’s shot and 
shell ; but he was not at all willing that his 
vessel- should be rammed, for the conse- 
quences would probably be disastrous. 
Accordingly he did not wait for the ap- 
proach of the two vessels, but steering 
seaward, he signalled for the other crab. 

When Crab B made its appearance, 
puffing its little black jets of smoke, as it 
answered the signals of the Director-in- 
chief, the commanders of the two British 
vessels were surprised. They had imag- 
ined that there was only one of these 
strange and terrible enemies, and had sup- 
posed that she would be afraid to make her 
peculiar attack upon one of them, because 
while doing so she would expose herself to 
the danger of being run down by the other. 
But the presence of two of these almost 


THE CrUEAT WAli SYNDICATE. 39 


submerged engines of destruction entirely 
changed the situation. 

But the commanders of the British ships 
were brave men. They had started to run 
down the strangely armoured American 
craft, and run her down they would, if they 
could. They put on more steam, and went 
ahead at greater speed. In such a furious 
onslaught the crabs might not dare to at- 
tack them. 

But they did not understand the nature 
nor the powers of these enemies. In less 
than twenty minutes Crab A had laid hold 
of one of the men-of-war, and Crab B of 
the other. The rudders of both were shat- 
tered and torn away ; and while the blades 
of one propeller were crushed to pieces, 
the other, with nearly half its shaft, was 
drawn out and dropped into the ocean. 
Helplessly the two men-of-war rose and 
fell upon the waves. 

In obedience to orders from the repeller, 
each crab took hold of one of the disabled 
vessels, and towed it near the mouth of 
the harbour, where it was left. 

The city was now in a state of feverish 
excitement, which was intensified by the 
fact that a majority of the people did not 
understand what had happened, while 


40 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 


those to whom this had been made plain 
could not comprehend why such a thing 
should have been allowed to happen. 
Three of Her Majesty’s ships of war, 
equipped and ready for action, had sailed 
out of the harbour, and an apparently in- 
significant enemy, without firing a gun, 
had put them into such a condition that 
they were utterly unfit for service, and 
must be towed into a dry dock. How 
could the Government, the municipality, 
the army, or the navy explain this ? 

The anxiety, the excitement, the nervous 
desire to know what had happened, and 
what might be expected next, spread 
that evening to every part of the Do- 
minion reached by telegraph. 

The military authorities in charge of the 
defences of the city were as much dis- 
turbed and amazed by what had happened 
as any civilian could possibly be, but they' 
had no fears for the safety of the place, 
for the enemy’s vessels could not possibly 
enter, nor even approach, the harbour. 
The fortifications on the heights mounted 
guns much heavier than those on the men- 
ofrwar, and shots from these fired from an 
elevation might sink even those “ under- 
water devils.” But, more than on the 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 41 


forts, they relied upon their admirable 
system of torpedoes and submarine bat- 
teries. With these in position and ready 
for action, as they now were, it was impos- 
sible for an enemy’s vessel, floating on the 
water or under it, to enter the harbour 
without certain destruction. 

Bulletins to this effect were posted in 
the city, and somewhat allayed the popu- 
lar anxiety, although many people, who 
were fearful of what might happen next, 
left by the evening trains for the interior. 
That night the news of this extraordinary 
affair was cabled to Europe, and thence 
back to the United States, and all over the 
world. In many quarters the account was 
disbelieved, and in no quarter was it thor- 
oughly understood, for it must be borne in 
mind that the methods of operation em- 
ployed by the crabs were not evident to 
those on board the disabled vessels. But 
everywhere there was the greatest desire 
to know what would be done next. 

It was the general opinion that the two 
armoured vessels were merely tenders to 
the submerged machines which had done 
the mischief. Having fired no guns, nor 
taken any active part in the combat, there 
was every reason to believe that they were 


42 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


intended merely as bomb-proof store-ships 
for their formidable consorts. As these 
submerged vessels could not attack a 
town, nor reduce fortifications, but could 
exercise their power only against vessels 
afloat, it was plain enough to see that the 
object of the American Syndicate was to 
blockade the port. That they would be 
able to maintain the blockade when the 
full power of the British navy should be 
brought to bear u^on them was generally 
doubted, though it was conceded in the 
most wrathful circles that, until 'the situa- 
tion should be altered, it would be unwise 
to risk valuable war vessels in encounters 
with the diabolical sea-monsters now lying 
oft the port. 

In the New York office of the Syndi- 
cate there was great satisfaction. The 
news received was incorrect and imperfect, 
but it was evident that, so far, everything 
had gone well. 

About nine o’clock the next morning, 
Bcpeller No. 1, with her consort half a 
mile astern, and preceded by the two 
crabs, one on either bow, approached to 
within two miles of the harbour mouth. 
The crabs, a quarter of a mile ahead of 
the repeller, moved slowly; for between 


THE gheat war syndicate. 43 


them they bore an immense net, three or 
four hundred feet long, and thirty feet 
deep, composed of jointed steel rods. 
Along the upper edge of this net was a 


J= 



Map or Canadian City and Harbour. 

A, H.M.S. “ ScarabseuB ; ” b, Crab A; c, Repeller No. 1; 
D, uew fort; B, old fort; r, city; g, island; h, island. 


series of air-floats, which were so gradu- 
ated that they were sunk by the weight of 
the net a few feet below the surface of the 
water, from which position they held the 
net suspended vertically. 

This net, which was intended to protect 


44 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


the repeller against the approach of sub- 
marine torpedoes, which might be directed 
from the shore, was anchored at each end, 
two very small buoys indicating its posi- 
tion. The crabs then falling astern, Re- 
peller No. 1 lay to, with the sunken net 
between her and the shore, and prepared 
to project the first instantaneous motor- 
bomb ever used in warfare. 

The great gun in the bow of the vessel 
was loaded with one of the largest and 
most powerful motor-bombs, and the spot 
to be aimed at was selected. This was a 
point in the water just inside of the mouth 
of the harbour, and nearly a mile from the 
land on either side. The distance of this 
point from the vessel being calculated, the 
cannon was adjusted at the angle called 
for by the scale of distances and levels, 
and the instrument indicating rise, fall, 
and direction was then put in connection 
with it. 

Now the Director-in-chief stepped for- 
ward to the button, by pressing which the 
power of the motor was developed. The 
chief of the scientific corps then showed 
him the exact point upon the scale wliich 
would be indicated when the gun was in 
its proper position, and the piece was then 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 45 

moved upon its bearings so as to approxi- 
mate as nearly as possible this direction. 

The bow of the vessel now rose upon 
the swell of the sea, and the instant that 
the index upon the scale reached the de- 
sired point, the Director-in-chief touched 
the button. 

Tliere was no report, no smoke, no visi- 
ble sign that the motor had left the can- 
non ; but at that instant there appeared, 
to those who were on the lookout, from a 
fort about a mile away, a vast aperture in 
the waters of the bay, which was variously 
described as from one hundred yards to 
five hundred yards in diameter. At that 
same instant, in the neighbouring head- 
lands and islands far up the shores of the 
bay, and in every street and building of 
the city, there was felt a sharp shock, as 
if the underlying rocks had been struck by 
a gigantic trip-hammer. 

At the same instant the sky above the 
spot where the motor had descended was 
darkened by a wide-spreading cloud. This 
was formed of that portion of the water of 
the bay which had been instantaneously 
raised to the height of about a thousand 
feet. The sudden appearance of this cloud 
was even more terrible than the yawning 


46 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


chasm in the Avaters of the bay or the 
startling shock ; but it did not remain 
loner in view. It had no sooner reached 
its highest elevation than it began to de- 
scend. There Avas a strong sea-breeze bloAV- 
ing, and in its descent this vast mass of 
water was impelled toAvard the land. 

It came down, not as rain, but as the 
waters of a vast cataract, as though a 
mountain lake, by an earthquake shock, 
had been precipitated in a body upon a 
valley. Only one edge of it reached the 
land, and here the seething flood tore 
away earth, trees, and rocks, leaving be- 
hind it great chasms and gullies as it 
descended to the sea. 

The bay itself, into Avhich the vast body 
of the Avater fell, became a scene of surg- 
ing madness. The towering Avails of water 
which had stood up all around the sud- 
denly created aperture hurled themselves 
back into the abyss, and dowm into the 
great chasm at the bottom of the bay, 
which had been made when the motor 
sent its shock along the great rock beds. 
DoAvn upon, and into, this roaring, boil- 
ing tumult fell the tremendous cataract 
from above, and the harbour became one 
wild expanse of leaping maddened Avaves, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 47 

hissing their whirling spray high into the 
air. 

During these few terrific moments other 
things happened which passed unnoticed 
in the general consternation. All along 
the shores of the bay and in front of the 
city the waters seemed to be sucked away, 
slowly returning as the sea forced them 
to their level, and at many points up and 
down the harbour there were submarine 
detonations and upheavals of the water. 

These were caused by the explosion, by 
concussion, of every torpedo and submarine 
battery in the harbour ; and it was with 
this object in view that the instantaneous 
motor-bomb had been shot into the mouth 
of the bay. 

The effects of the discharge of the 
motor-bomb astonished and even startled 
those on board the repellers and the crabs. 
At the instant of touching the button a 
hydraulic shock was felt on Repeller No. 
1. This was supposed to be occasioned by 
the discharge of the motor, but it was also 
felt on the other vessels. It was the same 
shock that had been felt on shore, but less 
in degree. A few moments after there 
was a great heaving swell of the sea, 
which tossed and rolled the four vessels, 


48 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


and lifted the steel protecting net so high 
that for an instant parts of it showed 
themselves above the surface like glisten- 
ing sea-ghosts. 

Experiments with motor-bombs had been 
made in unsettled mountainous districts, 
but this was the first one which had ever 
exerted its power under water. 

On shore, in the forts, and in the city, 
no one for an instant supposed that the 
terrific phenomenon which had just oc- 
curred was in any way due to the vessels 
of the Syndicate. The repellers were in 
plain view, and it was evident that neither 
of them had fired a gun. Besides, the 
firing of cannon did not produce such 
effects. It was the general opinion that 
there had been an earthquake shock, ac- 
companied by a cloud-burst and extraor- 
dinary convulsions of the sea. Such a 
combination of elementary disturbances 
had never been known in these parts ; and 
a great many persons were much more 
frightened than if they had understood 
what had really happened. 

In about half an hour after the discharge 
of the motor-bomb, when the sea had re- 
sumed its usual quiet, a boat carrying a 
white flag left Repeller No. 1, rowed 


THE GREAT ]rJ2v' SYNDICATE. 49 


directly over the submerged net, and 
made for the harbour. When the ap- 
proach of this flag-of-truce was perceived 
from the fort nearest the mouth of the 
Iiarbour, it occasioned much surmise. Had 
the earthquake brought these Syndicate 
knaves to their senses? Or were they 
about to make further absurd and out- 
rageous demands? Some irate officers 
were of the opinion that enemies like 
these should be considered no better than 
pirates, and that their flag-of-truce should 
be fired upon. But the commandant of 
the fort paid no attention to such coun- 
sels, and sent a detaclunent with a white 
flag down to the beach to meet the ap- 
proaching boat and learn its errand. 

The men in the boat had nothing to do 
but to deliver a letter from the Director- 
in-chief to the commandant of the fort, 
and then row back again. No answer 
was required. 

When the commandant read the brief 
note, he made no remark. In fact, he 
could think of no appropriate remark 
to make. The missive simjAy informed 
him that at ten o’clock and eighteen 
minutes A.M., of that day, the first bomb 
from the marine forces of the Syndicate 


50 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


had been discharged into the waters of 
the harbour. At, or about, two o’clock 
P.M., the second bomb would be dis- 
charged at Fort Pilcher. That was all. 

What this extraordinary message meant 
could not be imagined by any officer of 
the garrison. If the people on board the 
ships were taking advantage of the earth- 
quake, and supposed that they could 
induce Bntish soldiers to believe that it 
had been caused by one of their bombs, 
then were they idiots indeed. They 
would fire their second shot at Fort Pil- 
cher ! This was impossible, for they had 
not yet fired their first shot. These Syn- 
dicate people were evidently very tricky, 
and the defenders of the port must there- 
fore be very cautious. 

Fort Pilcher was a very large and un- 
finished fortification, on a bluff on the 
opposite side of the harbour. Work had 
been discontinued on it as soon as the 
Syndicate’s vessels had appeared off the 
port, for it was not desired to expose 
the builders and workmen to a possible 
bombardment. The place was now, there- 
fore, almost deserted ; but after the receipt 
of the Syndicate’s message, the comman- 
dant feared that the enemy might throw 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 51 

an ordinary shell into the unfinished 
works, and he sent a boat across the bay 
to order away any workmen or others who 
might be lingering about the place. 

A little after two o’clock P.M., an in- 
stantaneous motor-bomb was discharged 
from Repeller No. 1 into Fort Pilcher. 
It was set to act five seconds after impact 
with the object aimed at. It struck in a 
central portion of the unfinished fort, and 
having described a high curve in the air, 
descended not only with its own motive 
power, but with the force of gravitation, 
and penetrated deep into the earth. 

Five seconds later a vast brown cloud 
appeared on the Fort Pilcher promontory. 
This cloud was nearly spherical in form, 
with an apparent diameter of about a 
thousand yards. At the same instant a 
shock similar to that accompanying the 
first motor-bomb was felt in the city and 
surrounding country ; but this was not so 
severe as the other, for the second bomb 
did not exert its force upon the under- 
lying rocks of the region as the first one 
had done. 

The great brown cloud quickly began 
to lose its spherical form, part of it de- 
scending heavily to the earth, and part 


62 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE 




THE QBE AT WAR HYNBICATE. 53 


floating away in vast dust-clouds borne 
inland by the breeze, settling downward 
as they moved, and depositing on land, 
water, ships, houses, domes, and trees an 
almost impalpable powder. 

When the cloud had cleared away there 
were no fortifications, and the bluff on 
which they had stood had disappeared. 
Part of this bluff had floated away on the 
wind, and part of it lay piled in great 
heaps of sand on the spot where its rocks 
were to have upheld a fort. 

The effect of the motor-bomb was fully 
observed with glasses from the various 
fortifications of the port, and from many 
points of the city and harbour ; and those 
familiar with the effects of explosives 
were not long in making up their minds 
what had happened. They felt sure that 
a mine had been sprung beneath Fort 
Pilcher ; and they were now equally con- 
fident that in the morning a torpedo of 
novel and terrible power had been exploded 
in the harbour. They now disbelieved in 
the earthquake, and treated with contempt 
the pretence that shots had been fired 
from the Syndicate’s vessel. This was 
merely a trick of the enemy. It was not 
even likely that the mine or the torpedo 


54 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


had been operated from the ship. These 
were, in all probability, under the control 
of confederates on shore, and had been ex- 
ploded at times agreed upon beforehand. 
All this was perfectly plain to the military 
authorities. 

But the people of the city derived no 
comfort from the announcement of these 
conclusions. For all that anybody knew 
the whole city might be undermined, and 
at any moment might ascend in a cloud 
of minute particles. They felt that they 
were in a region of hidden traitors and 
bombs, and in consequence of this belief 
thousands of citizens left their homes. 

That afternoon a truce-boat again went 
out from Repeller No. 1, and rowed to the 
fort, where a letter to the commandant was 
delivered. This, like the other, demanded 
no answer, and the boat returned. Later 
in the afternoon the two repellers, accom- 
panied by the crabs, and leaving the steel 
net still anchored in its place, retired a 
few miles seaward, where they prepared 
to lay to for the night. 

The letter brought by the truce-boat 
was read by the commandant, surrounded 
by his officers. It stated that in twenty- 
four hours from time of writing it, wliich 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 55 


would be at or about four o’clock on the 
next afternoon, a bomb would be thrown 
into the garrisoned fort, under the com- 
mand of the officer addressed. As this 
would result in the entire destruction of 
the fortification, the commandant was 
earnestly counselled to evacuate the fort 
before the hour specified. 

Ordinarily the commandant of the fort 
was of a calm and unexcitable tempera- 
ment. During the astounding events of 
that day and the day before he had kept 
his head cool ; his judgment, if not correct, 
was the result of sober and earnest con- 
sideration. But now he lost his temper. 
The unparalleled effrontery and imperti- 
nence of this demand of the American 
Syndicate was too much for his self-pos- 
session. He stormed in anger. 

Here was the culmination of the knavish 
trickery of these conscienceless pirates 
who had attacked the port. A torpedo 
had been exploded in the harbour, an un- 
finished fort had been mined and blown up, 
and all this had been done to frighten him 
— a British soldier — in command of a 
strong fort well garrisoned and fully sup- 
plied with all the munitions of war. In 
the fear that his fort would be destroyed 


56 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


by a mystical bomb, he was expected to 
march to a place of safety with all his 
forces. If this should be done it would 
not be long before these crafty fellows 
would occupy the fort, and with its 
great guns turned inland, would hold the 
city at their mercy. There could be no 
greater insult to a soldier than to suppose 
that he could be gulled by a trick like 
this. 

No thought of actual danger entered the 
mind of the commandant. It had been 
easy enough to sink a great torpedo in the 
harbour, and the unguarded bluffs of Fort 
Pilcher offered every opportunity to the 
scoundrels who may have worked at their 
mines through the nights of several months. 
But a mine under the fort which he com- 
manded was an impossibility ; its guarded 
outposts prevented any such method of 
attack. At a bomb, or a dozen, or a 
hundred of the Syndicate’s bombs he 
snapped his fingers. He could throw 
bombs as well. 

Nothing would please him better than 
that those ark-like ships in the offing 
should come near enough for an artillery 
fight. A few tons of solid shot and shell 
dropped on top of them might be a very 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 57 


conclusive answer to their impudent de- 
mands. 

The letter from the Syndicate, together 
with his own convictions on the subject, 
were communicated by the commandant 
to the military authorities of the port, and 
to the War Office of the Dominion. The 
news of what had happened that day had 
already been cabled across the Atlantic 
back to the United States, and all over the 
world ; and the profound impression cre- 
ated by it was intensified when it became 
known what the Syndicate proposed to do 
the next day. Orders and advices from 
the British Admiralty and War Office 
sped across the ocean, and that night few 
of the leaders in government circles in 
England or Canada closed their eyes. 

The opinions of the commandant of the 
fort were received with but little favour by 
the military and naval authorities. Great 
preparations were already ordered to repel 
and crush this most audacious attack upon 
the port, but in the mean time it was 
highly desirable that the utmost caution 
and prudence should be observed. Three 
men-of-war had already been disabled by 
the novel and destructive machines of the 
enemy, and it had been ordered that for 


58 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the present no more vessels of the British 
navy be allowed to approach the crabs of 
the Syndicate. 

Whether it was a mine or a bomb which 
had been used in the destruction of the 
unfinished works of Fort Pilcher, it would 
be impossible to determine until an official 
survey had been made of the ruins ; but, 
in any event, it would be wise and humane 
not to expose the garrison of the fort on 
the south side of the harbour to the danger 
which had overtaken the works on the 
opposite shore. If, contrary to the opinion 
of the commandant, the garrisoned fort 
were really mined, the following day 
would probably prove the fact. Until 
this point should be determined it would 
be highly judicious to temporarily evacu- 
ate the fort. This could not be followed 
by occupation of the works by the enemy, 
for all approaches, either by troops in 
boats or by bodies of confederates by land, 
could be fully covered by the inland re- 
doubts and fortifications. 

When the orders for evacuation reached 
the commandant of the fort, he protested 
hotly, and urged that his protest be con- 
sidered. It was not until the command 
had been reiterated both from London and 


THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 59 


Ottawa, that he accepted the situation, and 
with bowed head prepared to leave his post. 
All night preparations for evacuation went 
on, and during the next morning the gar- 
rison left the fort, and established itself 
far enough away to preclude danger from 
the explosion of a mine, but near enough 
to be available in case of necessity. 

During this morning there arrived in the 
offing another Syndicate vessel. This had 
started from a northern part of the United 
States, before the repellers and the crabs, 
and it had been engaged in laying a private 
submarine cable, which should put the office 
of the Syndicate in New York in direct 
communication with its naval forces en- 
gaged with the enemy. Telegraphic con- 
nection between the cable boat and Re- 
peller No. 1 having been established, the 
Syndicate soon received from its Director- 
in-chief full and comprehensive accounts 
of what had been done and what it was 
proposed to do. Great was the satisfaction 
among the members of the Syndicate when 
these direct and official reports came in. 
Up to this time they had been obliged to 
depend upon very unsatisfactory intelli- 
gence communicated from Europe, which 
had been supplemented by wild state- 


60 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


merits and rumours smuggled across the 
Canadian border. 

To counteract the effect of these, a full 
report was immediately made by the Syn- 
dicate to the Government of the United 
States, and a bulletin distinctly describing 
what had happened was issued to the people 
of the country. These reports, which re- 
ceived a world-wide circulation in the 
newspapers, created a popular elation in 
the United States, and gave rise to serious 
apprehensions and concern in many other 
countries. But under both elation and 
concern there was a certain doubtfulness. 
So far the Syndicate had been successful ; 
but its style of warfare was decidedly ex- 
perimental, and its forces, in numerical 
strength at least, were weak. What would 
happen when the great naval power of 
Great Britain should be brought to bear 
upon the Syndicate, was a question whose 
probable answer was likely to cause ap- 
prehension and concern in the United 
States, and elation in many other coun- 
tries. 

The commencement of active hostilities 
had been precipitated by this Syndicate. 
In England preparations were making by 
day and by night to send upon the coast- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 61 

lines of the United States a fleet which, in 
numbers and power, would be greater than 
that of any naval expedition in the history 
of the world. It is no wonder that many 
people of sober judgment in America looked 
upon the affair of the crabs and the repel- 
lers as but an incident in the beginning 
of a great and disastrous war. 

On the morning of the destruction of 
Fort Pilcher, the Syndicate’s vessels moved 
toward the port, and the steel net was 
taken up by the two crabs, and moved nearer 
the mouth of the harbour, at a point from 
which the fort, now in process of evacua- 
tion, was in full view. When this had been 
done, Repeller No. 2 took up her position 
at a moderate distance behind the net, and 
the other vessels stationed themselves near 
by. 

The protection of the net was considered 
necessary, for although there could be no 
reasonable doubt that all the torpedoes in 
the harbour and river had been exploded, 
others might be sent out against the Syn- 
dicate’s vessels ; and a torpedo under a crab 
or a repeller was the enemy most feared 
by the Syndicate. 

About three o’clock the signals between 
the repellers became very frequent, and 


62 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


soon afterwards a truce-boat went out from 
Repeller No. 1. This was rowed with great 
rapidity, but it was obliged to go much 
farther up the harbour than on previous 
occasions, in order to deliver its message 
to an officer of the garrison. 

This was to the effect that the evacua- 
tion of the fort had been observed from 
the Syndicate’s vessels, and although it had 
been apparently complete, one of the scien- 
tific corps, with a powerful glass, had dis- 
covered a man in one of the outer redoubts, 
whose presence there was probably un- 
known to the officers of the garrison. It 
was, therefore, earnestly urged that this 
man be instantly removed ; and in order 
that this might be done, the discharge of 
the motor-bomb would be postponed half 
an hour. 

The officer received this message, and 
was disposed to look upon it as a new trick ; 
but as no time was to be lost, he sent a 
corporal’s guard to the fort, and there dis- 
covered an Irish sergeant by the name of 
Kilsey, who had sworn an oath that if 
every other man in the fort ran away like 
a lot of addle-pated sheep, he would not run 
with them ; he would stand to his post to 
the last, and when the couple of ships 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 63 


outside had got through bombarding the 
stout walls of the fort, the world would 
see that there was at least one British 
soldier who was not afraid of a bomb, be it 



The Arrest of the Irish Sergeant. 


little or big. Therefore he had managed 
to elude observation, and to remain be- 
hind. 

The sergeant was so hot-headed in his 
determination to stand by the fort, that it 
required violence to remove him; and it 


64 THE GREAT UVli? SYNDICATE, 


was not until twenty minutes past four 
that the Syndicate observer perceived that 
he had been taken to the hill behind which 
the garrison was encamped. 

As it had been decided that Repeller No. 
2 should discharge the next instantaneous 
motor-bomb, there was an anxious desire 
on the part of the operators on that vessel 
that in this, their first experience, they 
might do their duty as well as their com- 
rades on board the other repeller had done 
theirs. The most accurate observations, 
the most careful calculations, were made 
and re-made, the point to be aimed at be- 
ing about the centre of the fort. 

The motor-bomb had been in the cannon 
for nearly an hour, and everything had 
long been ready, when at precisely thirty 
minutes past four o’clock the signal to dis- 
chargo came from the Director-in-chief; 
and in four seconds afterwards the index 
on the scale indicated that the gun was in 
the proper position, and the button was 
touched. 

The motor-bomb was set to act the in- 
stant it should touch any portion of the 
fort, and the effect was different from that 
of the other bombs. . There was a quick, 
hard shock,, but it was all in the air.. Thqu- 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 65 


sands of panes of glass in the city and in 
houses for miles around were cracked or 
broken, birds fell dead or stunned upon the 
ground, and people on elevations at con- 
siderable distances felt as if they had re- 
ceived a blow ; but there was no trembling 
of the ground. 

As to the fort, it had entirely disap- 
peared, its particles having been instanta- 
neously removed to a great distance in every 
direction, falling over sucli a vast expanse 
of land and water that their descent was 
unobservable. 

In the place where the fortress had 
stood there was a wide tract of bare earth, 
which looked as if it had been scraped into 
a staring dead level of gravel and clay. 
The instantaneous motor-bomb had been 
arranged to act almost horizontally. 

Few persons, except those who from a 
distance had been watching the fort with 
glasses, understood what had happened; 
but every one in the city and surrounding 
country was conscious that something had 
happened of a most startling kind, and that 
it was over in the same instant in which 
they had perceived it. Everywhere there 
was the noise of falling window-glass. 
There were those who asserted that for an 


66 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


instant they had heard in the distance a 
grinding crash ; and there were others who 
were quite sure that they had noticed what 
might be called a flash of darkness, as if 
something had, with almost unappreciable 
quickness, passed between them and the 
sun. 

When the officers of tlie ganison mount- 
ed the hill before them and surveyed the 
place where their fort had been, there was 
not one of them who had sufficient com- 
mand of himself to write a report of what 
had happened. They gazed at the bare, 
staring flatness of the shorn bluff, and they 
looked at each other. This was not war. 
It was something supernatural, awful ! 
They were not frightened ; they were op- 
pressed and appalled. But the military 
discipline of their minds soon exerted its 
force, and a brief account of the terrific 
event was transmitted to the authorities, 
and Sergeant Kilsey was sentenced to a 
month in the guard-house. 

No one approached the vicinity of the 
bluff where the fort had stood, for danger 
might not be over; but every possible 
point of observation within a safe distance 
was soon crowded with anxious and terri- 
fied observers. A feeling of awe was no- 


THE GREAT ir^/i SYNDICATE. 67 


ticeable everywhere. If people could have 
liad a tangible idea of what had occurred, 
it would have been different. If the sea 
had raged, if a vast body of water had 
been thrown into the air, if a dense cloud 
had been suddenly ejected from the surface 
of the earth, they might have formed some 
opinion about it. But the instantaneous 
disappearance of a great fortification with 
a little more appreciable accompaniment 
than the sudden tap, as of a little hammer, 
upon thousands of window-panes, was 
something which their intellects could not 
grasp. It was not to be expected that the 
ordinary mind could appreciate the differ- 
ence between the action of an instanta- 
neous motor when imbedded in rocks and 
earth, and its effect, when opposed by 
nothing but stone walls, upon or near the 
surface of the earth. 

Early the next morning, the little fleet 
of the Syndicate prepared to carry out its 
further orders. The waters of the lower 
bay were now entirely deserted, craft of 
every description having taken refuge in 
the upper part of the harbour near and 
above the city. Therefore, as soon as it 
was light enough to make observations, 
Repeller No. 1 did not hesitate to discharge 


68 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


a motor-bomb into the harbour, a mile or 
more above where the first one had fallen. 
This was done in order to explode any tor- 
pedoes which might have been put into 
position since the discharge of the first 
bomb. 

There were very few people in the city 
and subLirbs who were at that hour out of 
doors where they could see the great cloud 
of water arise toward the sky, and behold 
it descend like a mighty cataract upon the 
harbour and adjacent shores ; but the 
quick, sharp shock which ran under the 
town made people spring from their beds ; 
and although nothing was then to be seen, 
nearly everybody felt sure that the Syndi- 
cate’s forces had begun their day’s work 
by exploding another mine. 

A lighthouse, the occupants of which 
had been ordered to leave when the fort 
was evacuated, as they might be in danger 
in case of a bombardment, was so shaken 
by the explosion of this motor-bomb that it 
fell in ruins on the rocks upon which it 
had stood. 

The two crabs now took the steel net 
from its moorings and carried it up the 
harbour. This was rather difficult on ac- 
count of the islands, rocks, and sand-bars : 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 69 


but the leading crab had on board a pilot 
acquainted with those waters. With the net 
hanging between them, the two submerged 
vessels, one carefully following the other, 
reached a point about two miles below the 
city, where the net was anchored across 
the harbour. It did not reach from shore 
to shore, but in the course of the morning 
two other nets, designed for shallower wa- 
ters, were brought from the repellers and 
anchored at each end of the main net, thus 
forming a line of complete protection 
against submarine torpedoes which might 
be sent down from the upper harbour. 

Repeller No. 1 now steamed into the 
harbour, accompanied by Crab A, and an- 
chored about a quarter of a mile seaward 
of the net. The other repeller, with her 
attendant crab, cruised about the mouth of 
the harbour, watching a smaller entrance to 
the port as well as the larger one, and thus 
maintaining an effective blockade. This 
was not a difficult duty, for since the 
news of the extraordinary performances of 
the crabs had been spread abroad, no mer- 
chant vessel, large or small, cared to ap- 
jDroach that port; and strict orders had 
been issued by the British Admiralty that 
no vessel of the navy should, until further 


70 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


instructed, engage in combat with the 
peculiar craft of the Syndicate. Until a 
plan of action had been determined upon, 
it was very desirable that English cruisers 
should not be exposed to useless injury 
and danger. 

This being the state of affairs, a message 
was sent from the office of the Syndicate 
across the border to the Dominion Govern- 
ment, which stated that the seaport city 
which had been attacked by the forces of 
the Syndicate now lay under the guns of 
its vessels, and in case of any overt act 
of war by Great Britain or Canada alone, 
such as the entrance of an armed force 
from British territory into the United 
States, or a capture of or attack upon an 
American vessel, naval or commercial, by 
a British man-of-war, or an attack upon an 
American port by British vessels, the city 
would be bombarded and destroyed. 

This message, which was, of course, in- 
stantly transmitted to London, placed the 
British Government in the apparent posi- 
tion of being held by the throat by the 
American War Syndicate. But if the 
British Government, or the people of Eng- 
land or Canada, recognized this position at 
all, it was merely as a temporary condi- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 71 


tion. In a short time the most powerful 
men-of-war of the Royal Navy, as well as a 
fleet of transports carrying troops, would 
reach the coasts of North America, and 
then the condition of affairs would rapidly 
be changed. It was absurd to suppose 
that a few medium-sized vessels, however 
heavily armoured, or a few new-fangled 
submarine machines, however destructive 
they might be, could withstand an armada 
of the largest and finest armoured vessels 
in the world. A ship or two might be dis- 
abled, although this Was unlikely, now 
that the new method of attack was under- 
stood ; but it would soon be the ports of 
the United States, on both the Pacific and 
Atlantic coasts, which would lie under the 
guns of an enemy. 

But it was not in the power of their 
nav}" that the British Government and the 
people of England and Canada placed their 
greatest trust, but in the incapacity of 
their petty foe to support its ridiculous 
assumptions. The claim that the city lay 
under the guns of the American Syndicate 
was considered ridiculous, for few people 
believed that these vessels had any guns. 
Certainly, there had been no evidence that 
any shots had been fired from them. In 


72 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the opinion of reasonable people the de- 
struction of the forts and the explosions in 
the harbour had been caused by mines — 
mines of a new and terrifying power — 
which were the work of traitors and con- 
federates. The destruction of the light- 
house had strengthened this belief, for its 
fall was similar to that which would have 
been occasioned by a great explosion under 
its foundation. 

But however terrifying and appalling 
had been the results of the explosion of 
these mines, it was not thought probable 
that there were any more of them. Tlfe 
explosions had taken place at exposed 
points distant from the city, and the most 
careful investigation failed to discover any 
present signs of mining operations. 

This theory of mines worked by con- 
federates was received throughout the 
civilized world, and was universally con- 
demned. Even in the United States the 
feeling was so strong against this apparent 
alliance between the Syndicate and British 
traitors, that there was reason to believe 
that a popular pressure would be brought 
to bear upon the Government sufficient to 
force it to break its contract with the Syn- 
dicate, and to carry on the war with the 


THE GBEAT WAB SYNDIC ATE. 73 


National army and navy. The crab was 
considered an admirable addition to the 
strength of the navy, but a mine under a 
fort, laid and fired by perfidious confeder- 
ates, was considered unworthy an enlight- 
ened people. 

The members of the Syndicate now found 
themselves in an embarrassing and danger- 
ous position — a position in which they 
were placed by the universal incredulity re- 
garding the instantaneous motor; and un- 
less they could make the world believe 
that they really used such a motor-bomb, 
the war could not be prosecuted on the 
plan projected. 

It was easy enough to convince the 
enemy of the terrible destruction the Syn- 
dicate was able to effect ; but to make that 
enemy and the world understand that this 
was done by bombs, which could be used 
in one place as well as another, was diffi- 
cult indeed. They had attempted to prove 
this by announcing that at a certain time 
a bomb should be projected into a certain 
fort. Precisely at the specified time the 
fort had been destroyed, but nobody be- 
lieved that a bomb had been fired. 

Every opinion, official or popular, con- 
cerning what it had done and what might • 


74 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


be expected of it, was promptly forwarded 
to the Syndicate by its agents, and it was 
thus enabled to see very plainly indeed 
that the effect it had desired to produce 
had not been produced. Unless the enemy 
could be made to understand that any fort 
or ships within ten miles of one of the Syn- 
dicate’s cannon could be instantaneously 
dissipated in the shape of fine dust, this war 
could not be carried on upon the principles 
adopted, and therefore might as well pass 
out of the hands of the Syndicate. 

Day by day and night by night the state 
of affairs was anxiously considered at the 
office of the Syndicate in New York. A 
new and important undertaking was de- 
termined upon, and on the success of this 
the hopes of the Syndicate now depended. 

During the rapid and vigorous prepara- 
tions which the Syndicate were now mak- 
ing for their new venture, several events 
of interest occurred. 

Two of the largest Atlantic mail steam- 
ers, carrying infantry and artillery troops, 
and conveyed by two swift and powerful 
men-of-war, arrived off the coast of Can- 
ada, considerably to the north of the 
blockaded city. The departure and prob- 
able time of arrival of these vessels 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDIC ATE. 75 


had been telegraphed to the Syndicate, 
through one of the continental cables, and 
a repeller with two crabs had been for 
some daj^s waiting for them. The English 
vessels had taken a high northern course, 
hoping they might enter the Gulf of St. 
Lawrence without subjecting themselves 
to injury from the enemy’s crabs, it not 
being considered probable that there were 
enough of these vessels to patrol the entire 
coast. But although the crabs were few 
in number, the Syndicate was able to place 
them where they would be of most use ; 
and when the English vessels arrived off 
the northern entrance to the gulf, they 
found their enemies there. 

However strong might be the incredu- 
lity of the enemy regarding the powers of 
a repeller to bombard a city, the Syndicate 
felt sure there would be no present in- 
vasion of the United States from Canada ; 
but it wished to convince the British 
Government that troops and munitions of 
war could not be safely transported across 
the Atlantic. On the other hand, the 
Syndicate very much objected to under- 
taking the imprisonment and sustenance 
of a large body of soldiers. Orders were 
therefore given to the officer in charge of 


76 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the repeller not to molest the two trans- 
ports, but to remove the rudders and ex- 
tract the screws of the two war-vessels, 
leaving them to be towed into port by the 
troop-ships. 

This duty was performed by the crabs, 
while the British vessels, both rams, were 
preparing to make a united and vigorous 
onset on the repeller, and the two men-of- 
war were left hopelessly tossing on the 
waves. One of the transports, a very fast 
steamer, had already entered the straits, 
and could not be signalled ; but the other 
one returned and took both the war-ships 
in tow, proceeding very slowly until, after 
entering the gulf, she was relieved by tug- 
boats. 

Another event of a somewhat different 
character was the occasion of much excited 
feeling and comment, particularly in the 
United States. The descent and attack 
by British vessels on an Atlantic port was 
a matter of popular expectation. The 
Syndicate had repellers and crabs at the 
most important points ; but, in the minds 
of naval officers and a large portion of the 
people, little dependence for defence was 
to be placed upon these. As to the ability 
of the War Syndicate .to pi’event inv^ion 


THE GREAT WAR SY ABDICATE. 77 


or attack by means of its threats to bom- 
bard the blockaded Canadian port, very 
few believed in it. Even if the Syndicate 
could do any more damage in that quarter, 
which was improbable, what was to pre- 
vent the British navy from playing the 
same game, and entering an American sea- 
port, threaten to bombard the place if the 
Syndicate did not immediately run all 
their queer vessels high and dry on some 
convenient beach ? 

A feeling of indignation against the 
Syndicate had existed in the navy from 
the time that the war contract had been 
made, and this feeling increased daily. 
That the officers and men of the United 
States navy should be penned up in har- 
bours, ports, and sounds, while British 
ships and the hulking mine-springers and 
rudder-pinchers of the Syndicate were al- 
lowed to roam the ocean at will, was a 
very hard thing for brave sailors to bear. 
Sometimes the resentment against this 
state of affairs rose almost to revolt. 

The great naval preparations of England 
were not yet complete, but single British 
men-of-war were now frequently seen off 
the Atlantic coast of the United States. 
No American vessels had been captured 


78 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

by these since the message of the Syndi- 
cate to the Dominion of Canada and the 
British Government. But one good reason 
for this was the fact that it was very diffi- 
cult now to find upon the Atlantic ocean 
a vessel sailing under the American flag. 
As far as possible these had taken refuge 
in their own ports or in those of neutral 
countries. 

At the mouth of Delaware Bay, behind 
the great Breakwater, was now collected a 
number of coastwise sailing-vessels and 
steamers of various classes and sizes ; and 
for the protection of these maritime refu- 
gees, two vessels of the United States 
navy were stationed at this point. These 
were the “ Lenox ” and “ Stockbridge,” 
two of the finest cruisers in the service, and 
commanded by two of the most restless 
and bravest officers of the American navy. 

The appearance, early on a summer 
morning, of a large British cruiser off the 
mouth of the harbour, filled those two 
commanders with uncontrollable belliofer- 
ency. That in time of war a vessel of the 
enemy should be allowed, undisturbed, to 
sail up and down before an American har- 
bour, while an American vessel filled with 
brave American sailors lay inside like a 


THE GREAT WAR SYNBICATE. 79 


cowed dog, was a thought which goaded 
the soul of each of these commanders. 
There was a certain rivalry between the 
two ships; and, considering the insult 
offered by the flaunting red cross in the 
o fling, and the humiliating restrictions im- 
posed by the Naval Department, each com- 
mander thought only of his own ship, and 
not at all of the other. 

It was almost at the same time tliat the 
commanders of the two ships separately 
came to the conclusion that the proper 
way to protect the fleet behind the Break- 
water was for- his vessel to boldly steam out 
to sea and attack the British cruiser. If 
this vessel carried a long-range gun, what 
was to hinder her from suddenly running 
in closer and sending a few shells into the 
midst of the defenceless merchantmen? In 
fact, to go out and fight her was the only 
way to protect the lives and property in 
the harbour. 

It was true that one of those beastly re- 
pellers was sneaking about off the cape, 
accompanied, probably, by an underwater 
tongs-boat. But as neither of these had 
done anything, or seemed likely to do any- 
thing, the British cruiser should be at- 
tacked without loss of time. 


80 TEIE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


When the commander of the “ Lenox 
came to this decision, his ship was well 
abreast of Cape Henlopen, and he there- 
fore proceeded directly out to sea. There 
was a little fear in his mind that the 
English cruiser, which was now bearing 
to the south-east, might sail off and get 
away from him. The “ Stockbridge ” was 
detained by the arrival of a despatch boat 
from the shore with a message from the 
Naval Department. But as this message 
related only to the measurements of a cer- 
tain deck gun, her commander intended, as 
soon as an answer could be sent off, to sail 
out and give battle to the British vessel. 

Every soul on board the “ Lenox ” was 
now filled with fiery ardour. The ship 
was already in good fighting trim, but 
every possible preparation was made for 
a contest which should show their country 
and the world what American sailors were 
made of. 

The “ Lenox ” had not proceeded more 
than a mile out to sea, when she perceived 
Repeller No. 6 coming toward her from 
seaward, and in a direction which in- 
dicated that it intended to run across her 
course. The “ Lenox,” however, went 
straight on, and in a short time the two 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 81 


vessels were quite near each other. Upon 
the deck of the repeller now appeared the 
director in charge, who, with a speaking- 
trumpet, hailed the “ Lenox ” and re- 
quested her to lay to, as he had something 
to communicate. The commander of the 
“ Lenox,” through his trumpet, answered 
that he wanted no communications, and 
advised the other vessel to keep out of 
his way. 

The “ Lenox ” now put on a greater 
head of steam, and as she was in any case 
a much faster vessel than the repeller, she 
rapidly increased the distance between 
herself and the Syndicate's vessel, so that 
in a few moments hailing was impossible. 
Quick signals now shot up in jets of black 
smoke from the repeller, and in a very 
short time afterward the speed of the 
“ Lenox ” slackened so much that the re- 
peller was able to come up with her. 

When the two vessels were abreast of 
each other, and at a safe hailing distance 
apart, another signal went up from the 
repeller, and then both vessels almost 
ceased to move through the water, although 
the engines of the ‘‘ Lenox ” were working 
at high speed, with her propeller-blades 
stirring up a whirlpool at her stern. 


82 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


For a minute or two the officers of the 
“ Lenox ” could not comprehend what had 
happened. It was first supposed that by 
mistake the engines had been slackened, 
but almost at the same moment that it 
was found that this was not the case, the 
discovery was made that the crab accom- 
panying the repeller had laid hold of the 
stern-post of the “Lenox,” and with all 
the strength of her powerful engines was 
holding her back. 

Now burst forth in the “ Lenox ” a 
storm of frenzied rage, such as was never 
seen perhaps upon any vessel since vessels 
were first built. From the commander to 
the stokers every heart was filled with fury 
at the insult which was put upon them. 
The commander roared through his trum- 
pet that if that infernal sea-beetle were 
not immediately loosed from his ship he 
would first sink her and then the repeller. 

To these remarks the director of the 
Syndicate’s vessels paid no attention, but 
proceeded to state as briefly and forcibly 
as possible that the “Lenox” had been 
detained in order that he might have an 
opportunity of speaking with her com- 
mander, and of informing him that his 
action in coming out of the harbour for 


THE GEE AT WAE SYNDICATE, 83 


the purpose of attacking a British vessel 
was in direct violation of the contract 
between the United States and the Syn- 
dicate having charge of the war, and that 
such action could not be allowed. 

The commander of the “Lenox” paid 
no more attention to these words than the 
Syndicate’s director had given to those he 
had spoken, but immediately commenced 
a violent attack upon the crab. It was 
impossible to bring any of the large guns 
to bear upon her, for she was almost under 
the stern of the “ Lenox ; ” but every means 
of offence which infuriated ingenuity 
could suggest was used against it. Machine 
guns were trained to fire almost perpen- 
dicularly, and shot after shot was poured 
upon that portion of its glistening back 
which appeared above the water. 

But as these projectiles seemed to have 
no effect upon the solid back of Crab H, 
two great anvils were hoisted at the end 
of the spanker-boom, and dropped, one 
after the other, upon it. The shocks were 
tremendous, but the internal construction 
of the crabs provided, by means of upright 
beams, against injury from attacks of this 
kind, and the great masses of iron slid off 
into the sea without doing any damage. 


84 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 

Finding it impossible to make any im- 
pression upon the mailed monster at his 
stern, the commander of the “ Lenox ” 
hailed the director of the repeller, and 
swore to him through his trumpet that if 
he did not immediately order the “ Lenox ” 
to be set free, her heaviest guns should be 
brought to bear upon his floating counting- 
house, and that it should be sunk, if it 
took all day to do it. 

It would have been a grim satisfaction 
to the commander of the “Lenox” to 
sink Repeller No. 6, for he knew the ves- 
sel when she had belonged to the United 
States navy. Before she had been bought 
by the Syndicate, and fitted out with 
spring armour, he had made two long 
cruises in her, and he bitterly hated her, 
from her keel up. 

The director of the repeller agreed to 
release the “ Lenox ” the instant her com- 
mander would consent to return to port. 
No answer was made to this proposition, 
but a dynamite gun on the “ Lenox ” was 
brought to bear upon the Syndicate’s ves- 
sel. Desiring to avoid any complications 
which might ensue from actions of this 
sort, the repeller steamed ahead, while the 
director signalled Crab H to move the stern 


TUE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 85 


of the “ Lenox ” to the windward, which, 
being quickly done, the gun of the latter 
bore upon the distant coast. 

It was now very plain to the Syndicate 
director that his words could have no 
effect upon the commander of the “ Len- 
ox,” and he therefore signalled Crab H to 
tow the United States vessel into port. 
When the commander of the “ Lenox ” 
saw that his vessel was beginning to move 
backward, he gave instant orders to put 
on all steam. But this was found to be 
useless, for when the dynamite gun was 
about to be fired, the engines had been 
ordered stopped, and the moment that the 
propeller-blades ceased moving, the nip- 
pers of the crab had been released from 
their hold upon the stern-post, and the 
propeller-blades of the “Lenox” were 
gently but firmly seized in a grasp which 
included the rudder. It was therefore im- 
possible for the engines of the vessel to 
revolve the propeller, and, unresistingly, 
the “ Lenox ” was towed, stern foremost, 
to the Breakwater. 

The news of this incident created the 
wildest indignation in the United States 
navy, and throughout the country the con- 
demnation of what was considered the 


86 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 

insulting action of the Syndicate was gen- 
eral. In foreign countries the affair was 
tlie subject of a good deal of comment, 
but it was also tlie occasion of much 
serious consideration, for it proved that 
one of the Syndicate’s submerged vessels 
could, without firing a gun, and without 
fear of injury to itself, capture a man-of- 
war and tow it whither it pleased. 

The authorities at Washington took in- 
stant action on the affair, and as it was 
quite evident that the contract between the 
United States and the Syndicate had been 
violated by the “ Lenox,” the commander 
of that vessel was reprimanded by the 
Secretaiy of the Navy, and enjoined that 
there should be no repetitions of his of- 
fence. But as the commander of the 
“ Lenox ” knew that the Secretary of the 
Navy was as angry as he was at what had 
happened, he did not feel his reprimand to 
be in any way a disgrace. 

It may be stated that the “ Stockbridge,” 
which* had steamed for the open sea as 
soon as the business which had detained 
her was completed, did not go outside the 
Cape. When her officers perceived with 
their glasses that the “Lenox” was re- 
turning to port stern foremost, they opined 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 87 


what had happened, and desiring that 
their ship should do all her sailing in the 
natural way, the “ Stockbridge ” was put 
about and steamed, bow foremost, to her 
anchorage behind the Breakwater, the 
commander thanking his stars that for 
once the “ Lenox ” had got ahead of him. 

The members of the Syndicate were very 
anxious to remove the unfavorable impres- 
sion regarding what was called in many 
quarters their attack upon a United States 
vessel, and a circular to the public was 
issued, in which they expressed their deep 
regret at being obliged to interfere with so 
many brave officers and men in a moment 
of patriotic enthusiasm, and explaining 
how absolutely necessary it was that the 
“ Lenox ” should be removed from a posi- 
tion where a conflict with English line-of- 
battle ships would be probable. There 
were many thinking persons who saw the 
weight of the Syndicate’s statements, but 
the effect of the circular upon the popular 
mind was not great. 

The Syndicate was now hard at worl^ 
making preparations for the grand stroke 
which had been determined upon. In the 
whole country there was scarcely a man 
whose ability could be made available in 


88 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

their work, who was not engaged in their 
service ; and everywhere, in foundries, 
workshops, and ship-yards, the construc- 
tion of their engines of Avar was being 
carried on by day and by night. No con- 
tracts were made for the delivery of Avork 
at certain times ; everything Avas done 
under the direct supervision of the Syndi- 
cate and its subordinates, and the work 
went on Avith a definiteness and rapidity 
hitherto unknown in naval construction. 

In the midst of the Syndicate’s labours 
there arrived off the coast of Canada the 
first result of Great Britain’s preparations 
for her Avar with the American Syndicate, 
in the shape of the Adamant,” the largest 
and finest ironclad Avhich had ever crossed 
the Atlantic, and Avhich had been sent to 
raise the blockade of the Canadian port 
by the Syndicate’s vessels. 

This great ship had been especially fitted 
out to engage in combat Avith repellers and 
crabs. As far as Avas possible the peculiar 
construction of the Syndicate’s vessels had 
been carefully studied, and English special- 
ists in the line of naval construction and 
ordnance had given most earnest consider- 
ation to methods of attack and defence 
most likely to succeed Avith these novel 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 89 


ships of war. The “ Adamant was the 
only vessel which it had been possible to 
send out in so short a time, and her cruise 
was somewhat of an experiment. If she 
should be successful in raising the block- 
ade of the Canadian port, the Biitish 
Admiralty would have but little difficulty 
in dealing with the American Syndicate. 

The most important object was to pro- 
vide a defence against the screw-extracting 
and rudder-breaking crabs; and to this 
end the “ Adamant ” had been fitted with 
what was termed a “stern-jacket.” This 
was a great cage of heavy steel bars, 
which was attached to the stern of the 
vessel in such a way that it could be raised 
high above the water, so as to offer no im- 
pediment while under way, and which, in 
time of action, could be let down so as to 
surround and protect the rudder and screw- 
propellers, of which the “Adamant” had 
two. 

This was considered an adequate defence 
against /the nippers of a Syndicate crab; 
but as a means of offence against these 
almost submerged vessels a novel contriv- 
ance had been adopted. From a great 
boom projecting over the stern, a large 
ship’s cannon was suspended perpendicu- 


90 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


laiiy, muzzle downward. This gun could 
be swung around to the deck, hoisted into 
a horizontal position, loaded with a heavy 
charge, a wooden plug keeping the load in 
position when the gun hung perpendicu- 
larly. 

If the crab should come under the stern, 
this cannon could be fired directly down- 
ward upon her back, and it was not be- 
lieved that any vessel of the kind could 
stand many such tremendous shocks. It 
was not known exactly how ventilation 
was supplied to the submarine vessels of 
the Syndicate, nor how the occupants were 
enabled to make the necessary observa- 
tions during action. When under way the 
crabs sailed somewhat elevated above the 
water, but when engaged with an enemy 
only a small portion of their covering 
armour could be seen. 

It was surmised that under and between 
some of the scales of this armour there was 
some arrangement of thick glasses, through 
which the necessary observation could be 
made ; and it was believed that, even if the 
heavy perpendicular shots did not crush in 
the roof of a crab, these glasses would be 
shattered by concussion. Although this 
might appear a matter of slight importance, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 91 


it was thought among naval officers it 
would necessitate the withdrawal of a crab 
from action. 

Ill consequence of the idea that the 
crabs were vulnerable between their 
overlapping plates, some of the “Ada- 
mant’s” boats were fitted out with Gatling 
and machine guns, by which a shower of 
balls might be sent under the scales, 
through the glasses, and into the body of 
the crab. In addition to their guns, these 
boats would be supplied with other means 
of attack upon the crab. 

Of course it would be impossible to de- 
stroy these submerged enemies by means 
of dynamite or torpedoes ; for with two 
vessels in close proximity, the explosion of 
a toi'[)edo would be as dangerous to the 
hull of one as to the other. The British 
Admiralty would not allow even tlie 
“ Adamant ” to explode torpedoes or dyna- 
mite under her own stern. 

With regard to a repeller, or spring- ar- 
moured vessel, the “Adamant” would rely 
upon her exceptionally powerful armament, . 
and upon her great weight and speed. She 
was fitted with twin screws and engines of 
the highest power, and it was believed that 
she would be able to overhaul, ram, and 


92 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


crush the largest vessel armoured or uii- 
armoured which the Syndicate would be 
able to bring against her. Some of her 
guns were of immense calibre, firing shot 
weighing nearly two thousand pounds, and 
requiring half a ton of powder for each 
charge. Besides these she carried an un- 
usually large number of large cannon and 
two dynamite guns. She was so heavily 
plated and armoured as to be proof against 
any known artillery in the world. 

She was a floating fortress, with men 
enough to make up the population of a 
town, and with stores, ammunition, and 
coal sufficient to last for a long term of 
active service. Such was the mighty 
English battle-ship which had come for- 
ward to raise the siege of the Canadian 
port. 

The officers of the Syndicate were well 
aware of the character of the “ Adamant,” 
her armament and her defences, and had 
been informed by cable of her time of sail- 
ing and probable destination. They sent 
out Repeller No. 7, with Crabs J and K, to 
meet her off the Banks of Newfoundland. 

This repeller was the largest and strong- 
est vessel that the Syndicate had ready for 
service. In addition to the spring armour 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 93 


with which these vessels were supplied, 
this one was furnished with a second coat 
of armour outside the first, the elastic steel 
ribs of which ran longitudinally and at 
right angles to those of the inner set. Both 
coats were furnished with a great number 
of improved air-buffers, and the arrange- 
ment of spring armour extended five or 
six feet beyond the massive steel plates 
with which the vessel was originally ar- 
moured. She carried one motor-cannon 
of large size. 

One of the crabs was of the ordinary 
pattern, but Crab K was furnished with a 
spring armour above the heavy plates of 
her roof. This had been placed upon her 
after the news had been received by the 
Syndicate that the “Adamant” would carry 
a perpendicular cannon over her stern, but 
there had not been time enough to fit out 
another crab in the same way. 

When the director in charge of Repeller 
No. 7 first caught sight of the “Adamant,” 
and scanned through his glass the vast 
proportions of the mighty ship which was 
rapidly steaming towards the coast, he felt 
that a responsibility rested upon him 
heavier than any which had yet been 
borne by an officer of the Syndicate ; but 


94 TUE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


he did not hesitate in the duty which he 
had been sent to perform, and immediately 
ordered the two crabs to advance to meet 
the “ Adamant,” and to proceed to action 
according to the instructions which tiiey 
had previously received. His own ship 
was kept, in pursuance of orders, several 
miles distant from the British ship. 

As soon as the repeller had been sighted 
from the “ Adamant,” a strict lookout had 
been kept for the approach of crabs ; and 
when the small exposed portions of the 
backs of two of these were perceived glis- 
tening in the sunlight, the speed of the 
great ship slackened. The ability of the 
Syndicate’s submerged vessels to move 
suddenly and quickly in any direction had 
been clearly demonstrated, and although a 
great ironclad with a ram could run down 
and sink a crab without feeling the con- 
cussion, it was known that it would be 
perfectly easy for the smaller craft to keep 
out of the way of its bulky antagonist. 
Therefore the “ Adamant ” did not try to 
ram the crabs, nor to get away from them. 
Her commander intended, if possible, to 
run down one or both of them ; but he did 
not propose to do this in the usual wa3^ 

As the crabs approached, the stern- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 95 


jacket of the “ Adamant ” was let down, 
and the engines were slowed. This stern- 
jacket, when protecting the rudder and 
propellers, looked very much like the cow- 
catcher of a locomotive, and was capable 
of being put to a somewhat similar use. 
It was the intention of the captain of the 
“Adamant,” should the crabs attempt to 
attach themselves to his stern, to suddenly 
put on all steam, reverse his engines, and 
back upon them, the stern-jacket answering 
as a ram. 

The commander of the “ Adamant had 
no doubt that in this way he could run 
into a crab, roll it over in the water, and 
when it was lying bottom upward, like a 
floating cask, he could move his ship to a 
distance, and make a target of it. So 
desirous was this brave and somewhat 
facetious captain to try his new plan upon 
a crab, that he forebore to fire upon the 
two vessels of that class which were ap- 
proaching him. Some of his guns were so 
mounted that their muzzles could be greatly 
depressed, and aimed at an object in the 
water not far from the ship. But these 
were not discharged, and, indeed, the crabs, 
which were new ones of unusual swiftness, 
were alongside the “ Adamant ” in an in- 


96 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

credibly short time, and out of the range of 
these guns. 

Crab J was on the starboard side of the 
“ Adamant,” Crab K was on the port side, 
and, simultaneously, the two laid hold of 
her. But they were not directly astern of 
the great vessel. Each had its nippers 
fastened to one side of the stern-jacket, 
near the hinge-like bolts which held it to 
the vessel, and on which it was raised and 
lowered. 

In a moment the “ Adamant ” began to 
steam backward; but the only effect of this 
motion, which soon became rapid, was to 
swing the crabs around against her sides, 
and carry them with her. As the vessels 
were thus moving the great pincers of the 
crabs were twisted with tremendous force, 
the stern-jacket on one side was broken 
from its bolt, and on the other the bolt 
itself was drawn out of the side of the 
vessel. The nippers then opened, and the 
stern-jacket fell from their grasp into 
the sea, snapping in its fall the chain by 
which it had been raised and lowered. 

This disaster occurred so quickly that 
few persons on board the “Adamant” 
knew what had happened. But the cap- 
tain, who had seen everything, gave instant 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 97 


orders to go ahead at full speed. The 
first thing to be done was to get at a dis- 
tance from those crabs, keep well away 
from them, and pound them to pieces with 
his heavy guns. 

But the iron screw-propellers had scarce- 
ly begun to move in the opposite direction, 
before the two crabs, each now lying at 
right angles with the length of the ship, 
but neither of them directly astern of her, 
made a dash with open, nippers, and Crab 
J fastened upon one propeller, while Crab 
K laid hold of the other. There was a din 
and crash of breaking metal, two shocks 
which were felt throughout the vessel, and 
the shattered and crushed blades of the 
propellers of the great battle-ship were 
powerless to move her. 

The captain of the “ Adamant,” pallid 
with fury, stood upon the poop. In a 
moment the crabs would be at his rudder! 
The great gun, double-shotted and ready 
to fire, was hanging from its boom over the 
stern. Crab K, whose roof had the ad- 
ditional protection of spring armour, now 
moved round so as to be directly astern of 
the “Adamant.” Before she could reach 
the rudder, her forward part came under 
the suspended cannon, and two massive 


98 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


steel shot were driven down upon her with 
a force sufficient to send them through 
masses of solid rock ; but from the surface 
of elastic steel springs and air-buffers they 
bounced upward, one of them almost fall- 
ing on the deck of the “ Adamant.” 

The gunners of this piece had been well 
trained. In a moment the boom was swung 
around, the cannon reloaded, and when 
Crab K fixed her nippers on the rudder of 
the “ Adamant,” two more shot came down 
upon her. As in the first instance she 
dipped and rolled, but the ribs of her un- 
injured armour had scarcely sprung back 
into their places, before her nippers turned, 
and the rudder of the “ Adamant ” was 
broken in two, and the upper portion 
dragged from its fastenings ; then a quick 
backward jerk snapped its chains, and it 
was dropped into the sea. 

A signal was now sent from Crab J to 
Kepeller No. 7, to the effect that the ‘‘Ada- 
mant” had been rendered incapable of 
steaming or sailing, and that she lay sub- 
ject to order. 

Subject to order or not, the “ Adamant ” 
did not lie passive. Every gun on board 
which could be sufficiently depressed, was 
made ready to fire upon the crabs should 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 99 


they attempt to get away. Four large boats, 
furnished with machine guns, grapnels, and 
with various appliances which might be 
brought into use on a steel-plated roof, were 
lowered from their davits, and immediately 
began firing upon the exposed portions of 
the crabs. Their machine guns were loaded 
with small shells, and if these penetrated 
under the horizontal plates of a crab, and 
through the heavy glass which was sup- 
posed to be in. these interstices, the crew 
of the submerged craft would be soon de- 
stroyed. 

The quick eye of the captain of the 
“ Adamant ” had observed through his glass, 
while the crabs were still at a considerable 
distance, their protruding air-pipes, and he 
had instructed the officers in charge of the 
boats to make an especial attack upon these. 
If the air-pipes of a crab could be rendered 
useless, the crew must inevitably be smoth- 
ered. 

But the brave captain did not know that 
the condensed-air chambers of the crabs 
would supply their inmates for an hour or 
more without recourse to the outer air, and 
that the air-pipes, furnished Avith valves 
at the top, were always withdrawn under 
water during action with an enemy. Nor 


100 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

did he know that the glass blocks under 
the armour-plates of the crabs, which were 
placed in rubber frames to protect them 
from concussion above, were also guarded 
by steel netting from injury by small balls. 

Valiantly the boats beset the crabs, 
keeping up a constant fusillade, and en- 
deavouring to throw grapnels over them. 
If one of these should catch under an over- 
lapping armour-plate it could be connected 
with the steam windlass of the “ Adamant,” 
and a plate might be ripped off or a crab 
overturned. 

But the crabs proved to be much more 
lively fish than their enemies had supposed. 
Turning, as if on a pivot, and darting from 
side to side, they seemed to be playing with 
the boats, and not trying to get away from 
them. The spring armour of Crab K inter- 
fered somewhat with its movements, and 
also put it in danger from attacks by grap- 
nels, and it therefore left most of the work 
to its consort. 

Crab J, after darting swiftly in and out 
among her antagonists for some time, sud- 
denly made a turn, and dashing at one of 
the boats, ran under it, and raising it on its 
glistening back, rolled it, bottom upward, 
into the sea. In a moment the crew of the 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 101 

boat were swimming for their lives. They 
were quickly picked up by two of the other 
boats, which then deemed it prudent to re- 
turn to the ship. 

But the second officer of the “ Adamant,” 
who commanded the fourth boat, did not 
give up tire fight. Having noted the spring 
armour of Crab K, he believed that if he 
could get a grapnel between its steel ribs 
he yet might capture the sea-monster. For 
some minutes Crab K contented itself with 
eluding him ; but, tired of this, it turned, 
and raising its huge nippers almost out of 
the water, it seized the bow of the boat, 
and gave it a gentle crunch, after which it 
released its hold and retired. The boat, 
leaking rapidly through two ragged holes, 
was rowed back to the ship, which it 
reached half full of water. 

The great battle-ship, totally bereft of 
the power of moving herself, was now 
rolling in the trough of the sea, and a sig- 
nal came from the repeller for Crab K to 
make fast to her and put her head to the 
wind. This was quickly done, the crab 
attaching itself to the stern-post of the 
“ Adamant ” by a pair of towing nippers. 
These were projected from the stern of the 
crab, and were so constructed that the 


102 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

larger vessel did not communicate all its 
motion to the smaller one, and could not 
run down upon it. 

As soon as the “ Adamant ” was brought 
up with her head to the wind she opened 
fire upon the repeller. The latter vessel 
could easily have sailed out of the range 
of a motionless enemy, but her orders for- 
bade this. Her director had been in- 
structed by the Syndicate to expose his 
vessel to the fire of the “ Adamant’s ” 
heavy guns. Accordingly the repeller 
steamed nearer, and turned her broadside 
toward the British ship. 

Scarcely had this been done when the two 
great bow guns of the “ Adamant ” shook 
the air with tremendous roars, each hurl- 
ing over the sea nearly a ton of steel. One 
of these great shot passed over the re- 
peller, but the other struck her armoured 
side fairly amidship. There was a crash 
and scream of creaking steel, and Repeller 
No. 7 rolled over to windward as if she 
had been struck by a* heavy sea. In a 
moment she righted and shot ahead, and, 
turning, presented her port side to the 
enemy. Instant examination of the armour 
on her other side showed that the two 
banks of springs were uninjured, and that 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 103 

not an air-buffer had exploded or failed to 
spring back to its normal length. 

Firing from the “ Adamant ” now came 
thick and fast, the crab, in obedience to 
signals, turning her about so as to admit 
the firing of some heavy guns mounted 
amidships. Three enormous solid shot 
struck the repeller at different points on 
her starboard armour without inflicting 
damage, while the explosion of several 
shells which hit her had no more effect 
upon her elastic armour than the impact of 
the solid shot. 

It was the desire of the Syndicate not 
only to demonstrate to its own satisfaction 
the efficiency of its spring armour, but to 
convince Great Britain that her heaviest 
guns on her mightiest battle-ships could 
have no effect upon its armoured vessels. 
To prove the absolute superiority of their 
means of offence and defence was the 
supreme object of the Syndicate. For 
this its members studied and worked by 
day and by night ; for this they poured 
out their millions; for this they waged 
war. To prove wliat they claimed would 
be victory. 

When Repeller No. 7 had sustained the 
heavy fire of the “ Adamant for about 


104 TUE GEE AT WAE SYNDICATE. 

half an hour, it was considered that the 
strength of her armour had been sufficiently 
demonstrated ; and, with a much lighter 
heart than when he had turned her broad- 
side to the “ Adamant,” her director gave 
orders that she should steam out of the 
range of the guns of the British ship. 
During the cannonade Crab J had quietly 
slipped away from the vicinity of the 
“ Adamant,” and now joined the repeller. 

The great ironclad battle-ship, with her 
lofty sides plated with nearly two feet of 
solid steel, with her six great guns, eacli 
weighing more than a hundred tons, with 
her armament of other guns, machine 
cannon, and almost every appliance of 
naval warfare, with a small army of offi- 
cers and men on board, was left in charge 
of Crab K, of which only a few square 
yards of armoured roof could be seen 
above the water. This little vessel now 
proceeded to tow southward her vast 
prize, uninjured, except that her rudder 
and propeller-blades were broken and use- 
less. 

Although the engines of the crab were 
of enormous power, the progress made was 
slow, for the Adamant ” was being towed 
stern foremost. It would have been easier 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 105 

to tow the great vessel had the crab been 
attached to her bow, but a ram which ex- 
tended many feet under water rendered 
it dangerous for a submerged vessel to 
attach itself in its vicinity. 

During the night the repeller kept com- 
pany, although at a considerable distance, 
with the captured vessel; and early the 
next morning her director prepared to 



send to the “ Adamant ” a boat with a flag- 
of-truce, and a letter demanding the sur- 
render and subsequent evacuation of the 
British ship. It was supposed that now, 
when the officers of the “Adamant” had had 
time to appreciate the fact that they had 
no control over the movements of their 
vessel ; that their armament was powerless 
against their enemies ; that the “ Adamant ” 
could be towed wherever the Syndicate 


106 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


chose to order, or left helpless in mid- 
ocean, — they would be obliged to admit 
that there was nothing for them to do but 
to surrender. 

But events proved that no such ideas 
had entered the minds of the “Adamant’s” 
officers, and their action totally prevented 
sending a flag-of-truce boat. As soon as 
it was light enough to see the repeller the 
“ Adamant ” began firing great guns at 
her. She was too far away for the shot 
to strike her, but to launch and send a 
boat of any kind into a storm of shot and 
shell was of course impossible. 

The cannon suspended over the stern of 
the “Adamant” was also again brought 
into play, and shot after shot was driven 
down upon the towing crab. Every ball 
rebounded from the spring armour, but the 
officer in charge of the crab became con- 
vinced that after a time this constant pound- 
ing, almost in the same place, would injure 
his vessel, and he signalled the repeller to 
that effect. 

The director of Repeller No. 7 had been 
considering the situation. There was only 
one gun on the “ Adamant ” which could 
be brought to bear upon Crab K, and it 
ViTould be the part of wisdom to interfere 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 107 

with the persistent use of this gun. Ac- 
cordingly the bow of the repeller was 
brought to bear upon the “ Adamant,” and 
her motor gun was aimed at the boom from 
which the cannon was suspended. 

The projectile with which the cannon 
was loaded was not an instantaneous 
motor-bomb. It was simply a heavy solid 
shot, driven by an instantaneous motor 
attachment, and was thus impelled by the 
same power and in the same manner as the 
motor-bombs. The instantaneous motor- 
power had not yet been used at so great a 
distance as that between the repeller and 
the “Adamant,” and the occasion was one 
of intense interest to the small body of 
scientific men having charge of the aiming 
and firing. 

The calculations of the distance, of the 
necessary elevation and direction, and of 
the degree of motor-power required, were 
made with careful exactness, and when the 
proper instant arrived the button was 
touched, and the shot with which the can- 
non was charged was instantaneously re- 
moved to a point in the ocean about a mile 
beyond the “Adamant,” accompanied by a 
large portion of the heavy boom at which 
the gun had been aimed. 


108 THE GBEAT WAB SYNDICATE. 


The cannon which had been suspended 
from the end of this boom fell into the sea, 
and would have crashed down upon the 
roof of Crab K, had not that vessel, in 
obedience to a signal from the repeller, 
loosened its hold upon the “Adamant” 
and retired a short distance astern. Mate- 
rial injury might not have resulted from 
the fall of this great mass of metal upon 
the crab, but it was considered prudent 
not to take useless risks. 

The officers of the “Adamant” were 
greatly surprised and chagrined by the 
fall of their gun, with which they had ex- 
pected ultimately to pound in the roof of 
the crab. No damage had been done to 
the vessel except the removal of a portion 
of the boom, with some of the chains and 
blocks attached, and no one on board the 
British ship imagined for a moment that 
this injury had been occasioned by the dis- 
tant repeller. It was supposed that the con- 
stant firing of the cannon had cracked the 
boom, and that it had suddenly snapped. 

Even if there had been on board the 
“Adamant” the means for rigging up 
another arrangement of the kind for per- 
pendicular artillery practice, it would have 
required a long time to get it into work- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 109 

ing order, and the director of Repeller 
No. 7 hoped that now the British captain 
would see the uselessness of continued re- 
sistance. 

But the British captain saw nothing of 
the kind, and shot after shot from his guns 
were hurled high into the air, in hopes 
that the great curves described would 
bring ^me of them down on the deck of 
the repeller. If this beastly store-ship, 
which could stand fire but never returned 
it, could'be sunk, the “ Adamant’s ” cap- 
tain would be happy. With the exception 
of the loss of her motive power, his vessel 
was intact, and if the stupid crab would 
only continue to keep the “ Adamant’s ” 
head to the sea until the noise of her can- 
nonade should attract some other British 
vessel to the scene, the condition of affairs 
might be altered. 

All that day the great guns of the 
“ Adamant ” continued to roar. The next 
morning, however, the firing was not re- 
sumed, and the officers of the repeller 
were greatly surprised to see approaching 
from the British ship a boat carrying a 
white flag. This was a very welcome 
sight, and the arrival of the boat was 
awaited with eager interest. 


110 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

During the night a council had been 
held on board the “ Adamant.” Her 
cannonading had had no effect, either in 
bringing assistance or in injuring the 
enemy ; she was being towed steadily 
southward farther and farther from the 
probable neighbourhood of a British man- 
of-war ; and it Avas agreed that it would 
be the part of Avisdom to come to terms 
Avith the Syndicate’s vessel. 

Therefore the captain of the “ Adamant ” 
sent a letter to the repeller, in which he 
stated to the persons in charge of that 
ship, that although his vessel had been 
injured in a manner totally at variance 
with the rules of naval warfare, he Avould 
overlook this fact and Avould agree to 
cease firing upon the Syndicate’s vessels, 
provided that the submerged craft Avhich 
Avas noAV made fast to his vessel should 
attach itself to the “ Adamant’s ” bow, and 
by means of a suitable cable Avhich she 
would furnish, Avould toAV her into British 
waters. If this were done he Avould guar- 
antee that the towing craft should have 
six hours in which to get away. 

When this letter was read on board the 
repeller it created considerable merriment, 
and an ansAver was sent back that no con- 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. Ill 

ditions but those of absolute surrender 
could be received from the British ship. 

In three minutes after this answer had 
been received by the captain of tlie “Ada- 
mant,” two shells went whirring and 
shrieking through the air toward Repeller 
No. 7, and after that the cannonading 
from the bow, the stern, the starboard, and 
the port guns of the great battle-sliip went 
on whenever there was a visible object on 
the ocean which looked in the least like 
an American coasting vessel or man-of-war. 

For a week Crab K towed steadily to 
the south this blazing and thundering 
marine citadel ; and then the crab signalled 
to the still*' accompanying repeller that it 
must be relieved. It had not been fitted 
out for so long a cruise, and supplies were 
getting low. 

The Syndicate, which had been kept 
informed of all the details of this affair, 
had already perceived the necessity of 
relieving Crab K, and another crab, well 
provisioned and fitted out, was already on 
the way to take its place. This was Crab 
C, possessing powerful engines, but in 
point of roof armour the weakest of its 
class.. It could be better spared than any 
other crab to tow the “ Adamant,” and as 


112 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

the British ship had not, and probably 
could not, put out another suspended 
cannon, it was considered quite suitable 
for the service required. 

But when Crab C came within half a 
mile of the “Adamant” it stopped. It 
Avas evident that on board the British ship 
a steady lookout had been maintained for 
the approach of fresh crabs, for several 
enormous shell and shot from heavy guns, 
which had been trained upward at a high 
angle, noAV fell into the sea a short dis- 
tance from the crab. 

Crab C would not have feared these 
heavy shot had they been fired from an or- 
dinary elevation ; and although no other 
vessel in the Syndicate’s service would 
liaA^e hesitated to run the terrible gauntlet, 
this one, by reason of errors in construc- 
tion, being less able than any other crab 
to resist the fall from a great height of 
ponderous shot and shell, thought it pru- 
dent not to venture into this rain of iron ; 
and, moving rapidly beyond the line of 
danger, it attempted to approach the “ Ad- 
amant ” from another quarter. If it could 
get within the circle of falling shot it 
would be safe. But this it could not do. 
On all sides of the “ Adamant ” guns had 


THE GBEAT \VAR SYNDICATE. 113 

been trained to drop shot and shells at a 
distance of half a mile from the ship. 

Around and around the mighty iron- 
clad steamed Crab C ; but wherever she 
went her presence was betrayed to the fine 
glasses on board the “ Adamant ” by the 
bit of her shining back and the ripple 
about it ; and ever between her and the 
ship came down that hail of iron in masses 
of a quarter ton, half tan, or nearly a 
whole ton. Crab C could not venture 
under these, and all day she accompanied 
the “Adamant” on her voyage south, 
dashing to this side and that, and looking 
for the chance that did not come, for all 
day the cannon of the battle-ship roared at 
her wherever she might be. 

The inmates of Crab K were now very 
restive and uneasy, for they were on short 
rations, both of food and water. They 
would have been glad enough to cast 
loose from the “ Adamant,” and leave the 
spiteful ship to roll to her heart’s content, 
broadside to the sea. They did not fear 
to run their vessel, with its thick roof- 
plates protected by spring armour, through 
the heaviest cannonade. 

But signals from the repeller commanded 
them to stay by the “ Adamant ” as long 


114 THE GBEAT WAB SYNDICATE. 


as they could hold out, and they were 
obliged to content themselves with a hope 
that when night fell the other crab would 
be able to get in under the stern of the 
“ Adamant,” and make the desired ex- 
change. 

But to the great discomfiture of the Syn- 
dicate’s forces, darkness had scarcely come 
on before four enormous electric lights 
blazed high up on the single lofty mast of 
the Adamant,” lighting up the ocean for 
a mile on every side of the ship. It was of 
no more use for Crab C to try to get in 
now than in broad daylight ; and all night 
the great guns roared, and the little crab 
manoeuvred. 

The next morning a heavy fog fell upon 
the sea, and the battle-ship and Crab C 
were completely shut out of sight of each 
other. Now the cannon of the “ Adamant ” 
were silent, for the only result of firing 
would be to indicate to the crab the loca- 
tion of the British ship. The smoke-sig- 
nals of the towing crab could not be seen 
through the fog by her consorts, and she 
seemed to be incapable of making signals 
by sound. Therefore the commander of the 
“ Adamant ” thought it likely that until the 
fog rose the crab could not find his ship. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 115 

What that other crab intended to do 
could be, of course, on board the “ Ada- 
mant,” only a surmise ; but it was believed 
that she would bring with her a torpedo to 
be exploded under the British ship. That 
one crab should tow her away from possi- 
ble aid until another should bring a tor- 
pedo to fasten to her stern-post seemed a 
reasonable explanation of the action of the 
Syndicate’s vessels. 

The officers of the “Adamant” little 
understood the resources and intentions 
of their opponents. Every vessel of the 
Syndicate carried a magnetic indicator, 
which was designed to prevent collisions 
with iron vessels. This little instrument 
was placed at night and during fogs at the 
bow of the vessel, and a delicate arm of 
steel, which ordinarily pointed upward at 
a considerable angle, fell into a horizontal 
position when any large body of iron ap- 
proached within a quarter of a mile, and, 
so falling, rang a small bell. Its point 
then turned toward the mass of iron. 

Soon after the fog came on, one of these 
indicators, properly protected from the at- 
traction of the metal about it, was put 
into position on Crab C. Before very long 
it indicated the proximity of the “Ada- 


116 TUE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

mant ; ” and, guided by its steel point, the 
crab moved quietly to the ironclad, at- 
tached itself to its stern-post, and allowed 
the happy crew of Crab K to depart coast- 
ward. 

When the fog rose the glasses of the 
“Adamant” showed the approach of no 
crab, but it was observed, in looking over 
the stern, that the beggarly devil-fish which 
had the ship in tow appeared to have made 
some change in its back. 

In the afternoon of that day a truce 
boat was sent from the repeller to the 
“ Adamant.” It was allowed to come 
alongside ; but when the British captain 
found that the Syndicate merely renewed 
its demand for his surrender, he waxed 
fiercely angry, and sent the boat back with 
the word that no further message need be 
sent to him unless it should be one com- 
plying with the conditions he had offered. 

The Syndicate now gave up the task 
of inducing the captain of the “ Adamant ” 
to surrender. Crab C was commanded to 
continue towing the great ship southward, 
and to keep her well away from the coast, 
in order to avoid danger to seaport towns 
and coasting vessels, while the repeller 
steamed away. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 117 

Week after week the “Adamant ” moved 
southward, roaring away with her great 
guns whenever an American sail came 
within possible range, and surrounding 
herself with a circle of bursting bombs to 
let any crab know what it might expect if 
it attempted to come near. Blazing and 
thundering, stern foremost, but stoutly, she 
rode the waves, ready to show the world 
that she was an impregnable British bat- 
tle-ship, from whicli no enemy could snatch 
the royal colours which floated high above 
her. 

It was during the first week of the in- 
voluntary cruise of the “Adamant” that 
the Syndicate finished its preparations for 
what it hoped would be the decisive 
movement of its campaign. To do this a 
repeller and six crabs, all with extraordi- 
nary powers, had been fitted out with great 
care, and also with great rapidity, for the 
British Government was working niglit 
and day to get its fleet of ironclads in 
readiness for a descent upon the American 
coast. Many of the British vessels were 
already well prepared for ordinary naval 
warfare ; but to resist crabs additional de- 
fences were necessary. It was known that 
the “ Adamant ” had been captured, and 


118 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

consequently the manufacture of stern- 
jackets had been abandoned ; but it was 
believed that protection could be effectu- 
ally given to rudders and propeller-blades 
by a new method which the Admiralty had 
adopted. 

The repeller which was to take part in 
the Syndicate’s proposed movement had 
been a vessel of the United States navy 
which for a long time had been out of 
commission, and undergoing a course of 
very slow and desultory repairs in a dock- 
yard. She had always been considered 
the most unlucky craft in the service, and 
nearly every accident that could happen 
to a ship had happened to her. Years and 
years before, when she would set out upon 
a cruise, her officers and crew would re- 
ceive the humorous sympathy of their 
friends, and wagers were frequently laid 
in regard to the different kinds of mishaps 
which might befall this unlucky vessel, 
which was then known as the ‘^Talla- 
poosa.” 

The Syndicate did not particularly desire 
this vessel, but there was no other that 
could readily be made available for its pur- 
poses, and accordingly the “ Tallapoosa ” 
was purchased from the Government and 


THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 119 


work immediately begun upon her. Her 
engines and hull were put into good condi- 
tion, and outside of her was built another 
hull, composed of heavy steel armour- 
plates, and strongly braced by great trans- 
verse beams running through the ship. 

Still outside of this was placed an im- 
proved system- of spring armour, much 
stronger and more effective than any 
which had yet been constructed. This, 
with the armour-plate, added nearly fifteen 
feet to the width of the vessel above water. 
All her superstructures were removed from 
her deck, which was covered by a curved 
steel roof, and under a bomb-proof canopy 
at the bow were placed two guns capable of 
carrying the largest-sized motor-bombs. 
The “ Tallapoosa,” thus transformed, was 
called Repeller No. 11. 

The immense addition to her weight 
would of course interfere very much with 
the speed of the new repeller, but this was 
considered of little importance, as she 
would depend on her own engines only in 
time of action. She was now believed to 
possess more perfect defences than any 
battle-ship in the world. 

Early on a misty morning, Repeller No. 
11, towed by four of the swiftest and most 


120 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

powerful crabs, and followed by two others, 
left a Northern port of the United States, 
bound for the coast of Great Britain. Pier 
course was a very northerly one, for the 
reason that the Syndicate had planned 
work for her to do while on her way across 
the Atlantic. 

The Syndicate had now determined, 
without unnecessarily losing an hour, to 
plainly demonstrate the power of the in- 
stantaneous motor-bomb. It had been in- 
tended to do this upon the “ Adamant,” but 
as it had been found impossible to induce 
the captain of that vessel to evacuate his 
ship, the Syndicate had declined to exhibit 
the efficiency of their new agent of destruc- 
tion upon a disabled craft crowded with 
human beings. 

This course had been highly prejudicial 
to the claims of the Syndicate, for as 
Bepeller No. 7 had made no use in the 
contest with the “ Adamant ” of the motor- 
bombs with which she was said to be sup- 
plied, it was generally believed on both 
sides of the Atlantic that she carried no 
such bombs, and the conviction that the 
destruction at the Canadian port had been 
effected by means of mines continued as 
strong as it had ever been. To correct 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 121 

these false ideas was now the duty of 
Repeller No. 11. 

For some time Great Britain had been 
steadily forwarding troops and munitions 
of war to Canada, without interruption 
from her enemy. Only once had the Syn- 
dicate’s vessels appeared above the Banks 
of Newfoundland, and as the number of 
these peculiar craft must necessarily be 
small, it was not supposed that their line 
of operations would be extended very far 
north, and no danger from them was appre- 
hended, provided the English vessels laid 
their courses well to the north. 

Shortly before the sailing of Repeller 
No. 11, the Syndicate had received news 
that one of the largest transatlantic mail 
steamers, loaded with troops and with 
heavy cannon for Canadian fortifications, 
and accompanied by the “ Craglevin,” one 
of the largest ironclads in the Royal Navy, 
liad started across the Atlantic. The 
first business of the repeller and her attend- 
ant crabs concerned these two vessels. 

Owing to the power and speed of the 
crabs which towed her, Repeller No. 11 
made excellent time ; and on the morning 
of the third day out the two British ves- 
sels were sighted. Somewhat altering 


122 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

their course the Syndicate’s vessels were 
soon within a few miles of the enemy. 

The “ Craglevin ” was a magnificent war- 
ship. She was not quite so large as the 
“ Adamant,” and she was unprovided with 
a stern-jacket or other defence of the kind. 
In sending her out the Admiralty had de- 
signed her to defend the transport against 
the regular vessels of the United States 
navy ; for although the nature of the con- 
tract with the Syndicate was well under- 
stood in England, it was not supposed that 
the American Government would long 
consent to allow their war vessels to remain 
entirely idle. 

When the captain of the “ Craglevin ” 
perceived the approach of the repeller he 
was much surprised, but he did not hesi- 
tate for a moment as to his course. He 
signalled to the transport, then about a 
mile to the north, to keep on her way 
while he steered to meet the enemy. It 
had been decided in British naval circles 
that the proper thing to do in regard to a re- 
peller was to ram her as quickly as possible. 
These vessels were necessarily slow and 
unwieldy, and if a heavy ironclad could 
keep clear of crabs long enough to rush 
down upon one, there was every reason to 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 123 

believe that the “ ball-bouncer,” as the 
repellers were called by British sailors, 
could be crushed in below the water-line 
and sunk. So, full of courage and deter- 
mination, the captain of the “ Craglevin ” 
bore down upon the repeller. 

It is not necessary to enter into details 
of the ensuing action. Before the “ Crag- 
levin ” was within half a mile of her 
enemy she was seized by two crabs, all of 
which had cast loose from the repeller, 
and in less than twenty minutes both of 
her screws were extracted and her rudder 
shattered. In the mean time two of the 
swiftest crabs had pursued the transport, 
and, coming up with her, one of them had 
fastened to her rudder, without, however, 
making any attempt to injure it. When 
the captain of the steamer saw that one of 
the sea-devils had him by the stern, while 
another was near by ready to attack him, 
he prudently stopped his engines and la}'’ to, 
the crab keeping his ship’s head to the sea. 

The captain of the “ Craglevin ” was a 
very different man from the captain of the 
“ Adamant.” He was quite as brave, but 
he was wiser and more prudent. He saw 
that the transport had been captured and 
forced to lay to ; he saw that the repeller 


124 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

mounted two heavy guns at her bow, and 
whatever might be the character of those 
guns, there could be no reasonable doubt 
that they were sufficient to sink an ordi- 
nary mail steamer. His own vessel was 
entirely out of his control, and even if he 
chose to try his guns on the spring armour 
of the repeller, it would probably result in 
the repeller turning her fire upon the 
transport. 

With a disabled ship, and the lives of so 
many men in his charge, the captnin of the 
“ Craglevin ” saw that it would be wrong 
for him to attempt to fight, and he did not 
fire a gun. With as much calmness as the 
circumstances would permit, he awaited 
the progress of events. 

In a very short time a message came to 
him from Repeller No. 11, which stated 
that in two hours his ship would be de- 
stroyed by instantaneous motor-bombs. 
Every opportunity, however, would be 
given for the transfer to the mail steamer 
of all the officers and men on board the 
“ Craglevin,” together with such of their 
possessions as they could take with them 
in that time. When this had been done 
the transport would be allowed to proceed 
on her way. 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 125 

To this demand nothing but acquiescence 
was possible. Whether or not there was 
such a thing as an instantaneous motor- 
bomb the “ Craglevin’s ” officers did not 
know ; but they knew that if left to her- 
self their ship would soon attend to her 
own sinking, for there was a terrible rent 
in her stern, o\ying to a pitch of the vessel 
while one of the propeller-shafts was being 
extracted. 

Preparations for leaving the ship were, 
therefore, immediately begun. The crab 
was ordered to release the mail steamer, 
which, in obedience to signals from the 
“Craglevin,” steamed as near that vessel 
as safety would permit. Boats were low- 
ered from both ships, and the work of 
transfer went on with great activity. 

There was no lowering of flags on board 
the “ Craglevin,” for the Syndicate attached 
no importance to such outward signs and 
formalities. If the captain of the British 
ship chose to haul down his colours he 
could do so; but if he preferred to leave 
them still bravely floating above his vessel 
he was equally welcome to do that. 

When nearly every one had left the 
“Craglevin,” a boat was sent from the 
repeller, which lay near by, with a note 


126 THE GEE AT WAE SYNDICATE. 

requesting the captain and first officer of 
the British ship to come on board Bepeller 
No. 11 and witness the method of dis- 
charging the instantaneous motor-bomb, 
after which they would be put on board 
the transport. This invitation struck the 
captain of the “ Craglevin ” with surprise, 
but a little reflection showed him that it 
would be wise to accept it. In the first 
place, it was in the nature of a command, 
which, in the presence of six crabs and a 
repeller, it would be ridiculous to disobey ; 
and, moreover, he was moved by a desire 
to know something about the Syndicate’s 
mysterious engine of destruction, if, indeed, 
such a thing really existed. 

Accordingly, when all the others had 
left the ship, the captain of’ the “ Crag- 
levin ” and his first officer came on board 
the repeller, curiously observing the spring 
armour over which they passed by means 
of a light gang-board with hand-rail. They 
were received by the director at one of 
the hatches of the steel deck, which were 
now all open, and conducted by him to 
the bomb-proof compartment in the bow. 
There was no reason why the nature of the 
repeller’s defences should not be known to 
the world nor adopted by other nations. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 127 

They were intended as a protection against 
ordinary shot and shell ; they would avail 
nothing against the instantaneous motor- 
bomb. 

The British officers were shown the 
motor-bomb to be discharged, which, ex- 
ternally, was very much like an ordinary 
shell, except that it was nearly as long as the 
bore of the cannon; and the director stated 
that although, of course, the principle of 
the motor-bomb was the Syndicate’s secret, 
it was highly desirable that its effects and 
its methods of operation should be gener- 
ally known. 

The repeller, accompanied by the mail 
steamer and all the crabs, now moved to 
about two miles to the leeward of the 
“ Craglevin,” and lay to. The motor- 
bomb was then placed in one of the great 
guns, while the scientific corps attended 
to the necessary calculations of distance, 
etc. 

The director now turned to the British 
captain, who had been observing every- 
thing with the greatest interest, and, with 
a smile, asked him if he would like to 
commit hari-kari ? 

As this remark was somewhat enigmati- 
cal, the director went on to say that if it 


128 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

would be any gratification to the captain 
to destroy his vessel with his own hands, 
instead of allowing this to be done by an 
enemy, he was at liberty to do so. This 
offer was immediately accepted, for if his 
ship was really to be destroyed, the captain 
felt that he would like to do it himself. 

When the calculations had been made 
and the indicator set, the captain was 
shown the button he must press, and stood 
waiting for the signal. He looked over the 
sea at the “ Craglevin,” which had settled 
a little at the stern, and was rolling heav- 
ily ; but she was still a magnificent battle- 
ship, with the red cross of England floating 
over her. He could not help the thought 
that if this motor mystery should amount 
to nothing, there was no reason why the 
“ Craglevin ” should not be towed into 
port, and be made again the grand war- 
ship that she had been. 

Now the director gave the signal, and 
the captain, with his eyes fixed upon his 
ship, touched the button. A quick shock 
ran through the repeller, and a black-gray 
cloud, half a mile high, occupied the place 
of the British ship. 

The cloud rapidly settled down, covering 
the water with a glittering scum which 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 129 

spread far and wide, and which had been 
the “ Craglevin.” 

The British captain stood for a moment 
motionless, and then he picked up a ram- 
mer and ran it into the muzzle of the cannon 
which had been discharged. The great 
gun was empty. The instantaneous motor- 
bomb was not there. 

Now he was convinced that the Syndi- 
cate had not mined the fortresses which 
they had destroyed. 

In twenty minutes the two British offi- 
cers were on board the trans^Dort, which 
then steamed rapidly westward. The crabs 
again took the repeller in tow, and the 
Syndicate’s fleet continued its eastward 
course, passing through the wide expanse 
of glittering scum which had spread itself 
upon the sea. 

They were not two-thirds of their way 
across the Atlantic when tlie transport 
reached St. John’s, and the cable told the 
world that the “ Craglevin ” had been an- 
nihilated. 

The news was received with amazement, 
and even consternation. It came from an 
officer in the Royal Navy, and how could 
it be doubted that a great man-of-war had 
been destroyed in a moment by one shot 


130 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE, 


from the Syndicate’s vessel ! And yet, even 
now, there were persons who did doubt,’! 
and who asserted that the crabs might 
have placed a great torpedo under the 
“ Craglevin,” that a wire attached to this 
torpedo ran out from the repeller, and that 
the British captain had merely fired the 
torpedo. But hour by hour, as fuller news 
came across the ocean, the number of these 
doubters became smaller and smaller. 

In the midst of the great public excite- 
ment which now existed on both sides of 
the Atlantic, — in the midst of all the con- 
flicting opinions, fears, and hopes, — the 
dominant sentiment seemed to be, in 
America as well as in Europe, one of curi- 
osity. Were these six crabs and one re- 
peller bound to the British Isles ? And if 
so, what did they intend to do when they 
got there ? 

It was now generally admitted that one 
of the Syndicate’s crabs could disable a 
man-of-war, that one of the Syndicate’s 
repellers could withstand the heaviest 
artillery fire, and that one of the Syndi- 
cate’s motor-bombs could destroy a vessel 
or a fort. But these things had been 
proved in isolated combats, where the new 
methods of attack and defence had had 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 131 

almost undisturbed opportunity for exhib- 
iting their efficiency. But what could 
a repeller and half a dozen crabs do 
against the combined force of the Royal 
Navy, — a navy which had in the last few 
years regained its supremacy among the 
nations, and which had made Great Britain 
once more the first maritime power in the 
world ? 

The crabs might disable some men-of- 
war, the repeller might make her calcu- 
lations and discharge her bomb at a ship 
or a fort, but what would the main body 
of the navy be doing meanwhile ? Over- 
whelming, crushing, and sinking to the 
bottom crabs, repeller, motor guns, and 
everything that belonged to them. 

In England there was a feeling of strong 
resentment that such a little fleet should 
be allowed to sail with such intent into 
British waters. This resentment extended 
itself, not only to the impudent Syndicate, 
but toward the Government ; and the oppo- 
sition party gained daily in strength. The 
opposition papers had been loud and reck- 
less in their denunciations of the slowness 
and inadequacy of the naval preparations, 
and' loaded the Government with the en- 
tire responsibility, not only of the damage 


132 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

wliicli had already been done to the forts, 
tlie ships, and the prestige of Great Brit- 
ain, but also for the threatened danger of 
a sudden descent of the Syndicate’s fleet 
upon some unprotected point upon the 
coast. This fleet should never have been 
allowed to approach within a thousand 
miles of England. It should have been 
sunk in mid-ocean, if its sinking had in- 
volved the loss of a dozen men-of-war. 

In America a very strong feeling of dis- 
satisfaction showed itself. From the first, 
the Syndicate contract had not been poj)u- 
lar ; but the quick, effective, and business- 
like action of that body of men, and the 
marked success up to this time of their 
inventions and their operations, liad caused 
a great reaction in their favour. They had, 
so far, successfully defended the Ameri- 
can coast, and when they had increased 
the number of their vessels, they would 
have been relied upon to continue that de- 
fence. Even if a British armada had set 
out to cross the Atlantic, its movements 
must have been slow and cumbrous, and 
the swift and sudden strokes with which 
the Syndicate waged war could have been 
given by night and by day over thousands 
of miles of ocean. 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE, 133 

Whether or not these strokes would 
have been quick enough or hard enough 
to turn back an armada might be a ques- 
tion ; but there could be no question of the 
suicidal policy of sending seven ships and 
two cannon to conquer England. It seemed 
as if the success of the Syndicate had so 
puffed up its members with pride and con- 
fidence in their powers that they had 
come to believe that they had only to show 
themselves to conquer, whatever might be 
the conditions of the contest. 

The destruction of the Syndicate’s fleet 
would now be a heavy blow to the United 
States. It would produce an utter want 
of confidence in the councils and judg- 
ments of the Syndicate, which could not 
be counteracted by the strongest faith in 
the efficiency of their engines of war ; and 
it was feared it might become necessary, 
even at this critical juncture, to annul the 
contract with the Syndicate, and to de- 
pend upon the American navy for the 
defence of the American coast. 

Even among the men on board the Syn- 
dicate’s fleet there were signs of doubt and 
apprehensions of evil. It had all been 
very well so far, but fighting one ship at 
a time was a very different thing from 


134 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


steaming into the midst of a hundred ships. 
On board the repeller there was now an 
additional reason for fears and misgivings. 
The unlucky character of the vessel when 
it had been the “ Tallapoosa ” was known, 
and not a few of the men imagined that 
it must now be time for some new disas- 
ter to tliis ill-starred craft, and if her evil 
genius had desired fresh disaster for her, 
it was certainly sending her into a good 
place to look for it. 

But the Syndicate neither doubted nor 
hesitated nor paid any attention to the 
doubts and condemnations which they 
heard from every quarter. Four days after 
the news of the destruction of the “ Crag- 
levin ” had been telegraphed from Canada 
to London, the Syndicate’s fleet entered 
the English Channel. Owing to the power 
and speed of the crabs, Repeller No. 11 had 
made a passage of the Atlantic which in 
her old naval career would have been con- 
sidered miraculous. 

Craft of various kinds were now passed, 
but none of them carried the British flag. 
In the expectation of the arrival of the 
enemy, British merchantmen and fishing 
vessels had been advised to keep in the 
background until the British navy had con- 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 135 


eluded its business with the vessels of the 
American Syndicate. 

As has been said before, the British 
Admiralty had adopted a new method of 
defence for the rudders and screw-propel- 
lers of naval vessels against the attacks of 
submerged craft. The work of construct- 
ing the new appliances had been pushed 
forward as fast as possible, but so far only 
one of these had been finished and attached 
to a man-of-war. 

The ‘‘ Llangaron ” was a recently built 
ironclad of the same size and class as the 
“ Adamant ; ” and to her had been attached 
the new stern-defence. This was an im- 
mense steel cylinder, entirely closed, and 
rounded at the ends. It was about ten 
feet in diameter, and strongly braced inside. 
It was suspended by chains from two davits 
which projected over the stern of the vessel. 
When sailing this cylinder was hoisted up 
to the davits, but when the ship was pre- 
pared for action it was lowered until it lay, 
nearly submerged, abaft of the rudder. In 
this position its ends projected about fifteen 
feet on either side of the propeller-blades. 

It was believed that this cylinder would 
effectually prevent a crab from getting 
near enough to the propeller or the rudder 


136 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 


to do any damage. It could not be tom 
away as the stern-jacket had been, for the 
rounded and smooth sides and ends of the 
massive cylinder would offer no hold to 
the forceps of the crabs ; and, approaching 
from any quarter, it would be impossible 
for these forceps to reach rudder or screw. 

The Syndicate’s little fleet arrived in 
British waters late in the day, and early 
the next morning it appeared about twenty 
miles to the south of the Isle of Wight, and 
headed to the north-east, as if it were mak- 
ing for Portsmouth. The course of these 
vessels greatly surprised the English Gov- 
ernment and naval authorities. It was ex- 
pected that an attack would probably be 
made upon some comparatively unprotected 
spot on the British seaboard, and therefore 
on the west coast of Ireland and in St. 
George’s Channel preparations of the most 
formidable character had been made to 
defend British ports against Bepeller No. 
11 and her attendant crabs. Particularly 
was this the case in Bristol Channel, where 
a large number of ironclads were stationed, 
and which was to have been the destination 
of the “Llangaron” if the Syndicate’s 
vessels had delayed their coming long 
enough to allow her to get around there. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 137 

That this little fleet should have sailed 
straight for England’s great naval strong- 
hold was something that the British Admi- 
ralty could not understand. The fact Wc^s 
not appreciated that it was the object of the 
Syndicate to measure its strength with the 
greatest strength of the enemy. Anything 
less than this would not avail its purpose. 

Notwithstanding that so many vessels 
had been sent to different parts of the coast, 
there was still in Portsmouth harbour a large 
number of war vessels of various classes, 
all in commission and ready for action. 
The greater part of these had received 
orders to cruise that day in the channel. 
Consequently, it was still early in the 
morning when, around the eastern end of 
the Isle of Wight, there appeared a British 
fleet composed of fifteen of the finest iron- 
clads, with several gun-boats and cruisers, 
and a number of torpedo-boats. 

It was a noble sight, for besides the war- 
ships there was another fleet hanging upon 
the outskirts of the first, and composed of 
craft, large and small, and from both sides 
of the channel, filled with those who were 
anxious to witness from afar the sea-fight 
which was to take place under such novel 
conditions. Many of these observers were 


138 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

reporters and special correspondents for 
great newspapers. On some of the vessels 
which came up from the French coast were 
men with marine glasses of extraordinary 
power, whose business it was to send an 
early and accurate report of the affair to 
the office of the War Syndicate in New 
York. 

As soon as the British ships came in 
sight, the four crabs cast off from Bepeller 
No. 11. Then with the other two they 
prepared for action, moving considerably 
in advance of the repeller, which now 
steamed forward very slowly. The wind 
was strong from the north-west, and the 
sea high, the shining tops of the crabs fre- 
quently disappearing under the waves. 

The British fleet came steadily on, 
headed by the great “ Llangaron.” This 
vessel was very much in advance of the 
others, for knowing that when she was 
really in action and the great cylinder 
which formed her stern-guard was lowered 
into the water her speed would be much 
retarded, she had put on all steam, and 
being the swiftest war-ship of her class, 
she had distanced all her consorts. It was 
highly important that she should begin the 
fight, and engage the attention of as many 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 139 

crabs as possible, while certain of the other 
ships attacked the repeller with their rams. 
Although it was now generally believed 
that motor-bombs from a repeller might 
destroy a man-of-war, it was also consid- 
ered probable that the accurate calcula- 
tions which appeared to be necessary to 
precision of aim could not be made when 
the object of the aim was in rapid motion. 

But whether or not one or more motor- 
bombs did strike the mark, or whether or 
not one or more vessels were blown into 
fine particles, there were a dozen iron- 
clads in that fleet, each of whose command- 
ers and officers were determined to run into 
that repeller and crush her, if so be they 
held together long enough to reach her. 

The commanders of the torpedo-boats 
had orders to direct their swift messengers 
of destruction first against the crabs, for 
these vessels were far in advance of the 
repeller, and coming on with a rapidity 
which showed that they were determined 
upon mischief. If a torpedo, shot from a 
torpedo-boat, and speeding swiftly by its 
own powers beneath the waves, should 
strike the submerged hull of a crab, there 
would be one crab the less in the English 
Channel. 


140 THE GREAT WAR SYNEICATE. 

As has been said, the “ Llangaron ” 
came rushing on, distancing everything, 
even the torpedo-boats. If, before she was 
obliged to lower her cylinder, she could 
get near enough to the almost stationary 
repeller to take part in the attack on her, 
she would then be content to slacken 
speed and let the crabs nibble awhile at 
her stern. 

Two of the latest constructed and larg- 
est crabs, Q and R, headed at full speed 
to meet the “Llangaron,” who, as she 
came on, opened the ball by sending a 
“ rattler ” in the shape of a five-hundred- 
pound shot into the ribs of the repeller, 
then at least four miles distant, and imme- 
diately after began firing her dynamite 
guns, which were of limited range, at the 
roofs of the advancing crabs. 

There were some on board the repeller 
who, at the moment the great shot struck 
her, with a ringing and clangour of steel 
springs, such as never was heard before, 
wished that in her former state of exist- 
ence she had been some other vessel than 
the “ Tallapoosa.” 

But every spring sprang back to its 
place as the great mass of iron glanced off 
into the sea. The dynamite bombs flew 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 141 

over the tops of the crabs, whose rapid 
motions and slightly exposed surfaces gave 
little chance for accurate aim, and in a 
short time they were too close to the 
“ Llangaron ” for this class of gun to be 
used upon them. 

As the crabs came nearer, the “ Llan- 
garon ” lowered the great steel cylinder 
which hung across her stern, until it lay 
almost entirely under water, and abaft 
of her rudder and propeller-blades. She 
now moved slowly through the water, and 
her men greeted the advancing crabs with 
yells of defiance, and a shower of shot from 
machine guns. 

The character of the new defence which 
had been fitted to the “ Llangaron ” was 
known to the Syndicate, and the directors 
of the two new crabs understood the heavy 
piece of work which lay before them. But 
their plans of action had been well con- 
sidered, and they made straight for the 
stern of the British ship. 

It was, of course, impossible to endeav- 
our to grasp that great cylinder with its 
rounded ends; their forceps would slip 
from any portion of its smooth surface on 
which they should endeavour to lay hold, 
and no such attempt was made. Keeping 


142 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

near the cylinder, one at each end of it, the 
two moved slowly after the “ Llangaron,” 
apparently discouraged. 

In a short time, however, it was per- 
ceived by those on board the ship that a 
change had taken place in the appearance 
of the crabs ; the visible portion of their 
backs was growing larger and larger ; they 
were rising in the water. Their mailed 
roofs became visible from end to end, and 
the crowd of observers looking down from 
the ship were amazed to see what large 
vessels they were. 

Higher and higher the crabs arose, their 
powerful air-pumps working at their great- 
est capacity, until their ponderous pincers 
became visible above the water. Then 
into the minds of the officers of the ‘‘ Llan- 
garon ” flashed the true object of this up- 
rising, which to the crew had seemed an 
intention on the part of the sea-devils to 
clamber on board. 

If the cylinder were left in its present 
position the crab might seize the chains by 
wliich it was suspended, while if it were 
raised it would cease to be a defence. 
Notwithstanding this latter contingency, 
the order was quickly given to raise the 
cylinder; but befare the hoisting engine 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 143 

had been set in motion, Crab Q thrust 
forward her forceps over the top of the 
cylinder . and held it down. Another 
thrust, and the iron jaws had grasped one 
of the two ponderous chains by which the 
cylinder was suspended. 

The other end of the cylinder began to 
rise, but at this moment Crab R, apparently 
by a single effort, lifted herself a foot 
higher out of the sea ; her pincers flashed 
forward, and the other chain was grasped. 

The two crabs were now placed in the 
most extraordinary position. Tlie over- 
hang of their roofs prevented an attack on 
their hulls by the “ Llangaron,” but their 
un mailed hulls were so greatly exposed 
that a few shot from another ship could 
easily have destroyed them. But as any 
ship firing at them would be very likely 
to hit the “ Llangaron,” their directors 
felt safe on this point. 

Three of the foremost ironclads, less 
than two miles away, were heading di- 
rectly for them, and their rams might 
be used with but little danger to the 
“ Llangaron ; ” but, on the other hand, 
three swift crabs were heading directly for 
these ironclads. 

It was impossible for Crabs Q and R to 


144 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

operate in. the usual way. Their massive 
forceps, lying flat against the top of the 
cylinder, could not be twisted. The enor- 
mous chains they held could not be severed 
by the greatest pressure, and if both crabs 
backed at once they would probably do no 
more than tow the “Llangaron” stern 
foremost. There was, moreover, no time 
to waste in experiments, for other rams 
would be commg on, and there were not 
crabs enough to attend to them all. 

No time was wasted. Q signalled to R, 
and R back again, and instantly the two 
crabs, each still grasping a chain of the 
cylinder, began to sink. On board the 
“ Llangaron ” an order was shouted to let 
out the cylinder chains ; but as these chains 
had only been made long enough to allow 
the top of the cylinder to hang at or a 
little below the surface of the water, a 
foot or two of length was all that could be 
gained. 

The davits from which the cylinder 
hung were thick and strong, and the iron 
windlasses to which the chains were at- 
tached were large and ponderous; but 
these were not strong enough to withstand 
the weight of two crabs with steel-ar- 
moured roofs, enormous engines, and iron 


THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 145 


hull. In less than a minute one davit 
snapped like a pipe-stem under the tre- 
mendous strain, and immediately after- 
ward the windlass to which the chain was 
attached was torn from its bolts, and went 
crashing overboard, tearing away a portion 
of the stern-rail in its descent. 

Crab Q instantly released the chain it 
had held, and in a moment the great cyl- 
inder hung almost perpendicularly from 
one chain. But only for a moment. The 
nippers of Crab R still firmly held the 
chain, and the tremendous leverage ex- 
erted by the falling of one end of the cyl- 
inder wrenched it from the rigidly held 
end of its chain, and, in a flash, the enor- 
mous stern-guard of the “Llangaron” 
sunk, end foremost, to the bottom of the 
channel. 

In ten minutes afterward, the “ Llanga- 
ron,” rudderless, and with the blades of 
her propellers shivered and crushed, was 
slowly turning her starboard to the wind 
and the sea, and beginning to roll like a 
log of eight thousand tons. 

Besides the “ Llangaron,” three iron- 
clads were now drifting broadside to the 
sea. But there was no time to succour dis- 
abled vessels, for the rest of the fleet was 


146 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

coming on, and there was great work for 
the crabs. 

Against these enemies, swift of motion 
and sudden in action, the torpedo-boats 
found it almost impossible to operate, for 
the British ships and the crabs were so 
rapidly nearing each other that a torpedo 
sent out against an enemy was more than 
likely to run against the hull of a friend. 
Each crab sped at the top of its speed for 
a ship, not only to attack, but also to pro- 
tect itself. 

Once only did the crabs give the tor- 
pedo-boats a chance. A mile or two north 
of the scene of action, a large cruiser was 
making her way rapidly toward the re- 
peller, which was still lying almost motion- 
less, four miles to the westward. As it 
was highly probable that this vessel carried 
dynamite guns. Crab Q, which was the 
fastest of her class, was signalled to go 
after her. She had scarcely begun her 
course across the open space of sea before 
a torpedo-boat was - in pursuit. Fast as 
was the latter, the crab was faster, and 
quite as easily managed. She was in a 
position of great danger, and her only 
safety lay in keeping herself on a line be- 
tween the torpedo-boat and the gun-boat, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 147 

and to shorten as quickly as possible the 
distance between herself and that vessel. 

If the torpedo-boat shot to one side in 
order to get the crab out of line, the crab, 
its back sometimes hidden by the tossing 
waves, sped also to the same side. When 
the torpedo-boat could aim a gun at the 
crab and not at the gun-boat, a deadly 
torpedo flew into the sea ; but a tossing sea 
and a shifting target were unfavourable to 
the gunner’s aim. It was not long, how- 
ever, before the crab had run the chase 
which might so readily have been fatal to 
it, and was so near the gun-boat that no 
more torpedoes could be fired at it. 

Of course the officers and crew of the 
gun-boat had watched with most anxious 
interest the chase of the crab. The vessel 
was one which had been fitted out for 
service with dynamite guns, of which she 
carried some of very long range for this 
class of. artillery, and she had been ordered 
to get astern of the repeller and to do her 
best to put a few dynamite bombs on 
board of her. 

The dynamite gun-boat therefore had 
kept ahead at full speed, determined to 
carry out her instructions if she should be 
allowed to do so; but her speed was not 


148 THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE. 

as great as that of a crab, and when the 
torpedo-boat had given up the chase, and 
the dreaded crab was drawing swiftly 
near, the captain thought it time for bra- 
very to give place to prudence. With the 
large amount of explosive material of the 
most tremendous and terrific character 
which he had on board, it would be the 
insanity of courage for him to allow his 
comparatively small vessel to be racked, 
shaken, and partially shivered by the pow- 
erful jaws of the on-coming foe. As he 
could neither fly nor fight, he hauled down 
his flag in token of surrender, the first in- 
stance of the kind which had occurred in 
this war. 

When the director of Crab Q, through 
his lookout-glass, beheld this action on the 
part of the gun-boat, he was a little per- 
plexed as to what he should next do. To 
accept the surrender of the British vessel, 
and to assume control of her, it was neces- 
sary to communicate with her. The com- 
munications of the crabs were made entirely 
by black-smoke signals, and these the cap- 
tain of the gun-boat could not understand. 
The heavy hatches in the mailed roof 
which could be put in use when the crab 
was cruising, could not be opened when 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 149 

slie was at lier fighting depth, and in a 
tossing sea. 

A means was soon devised of communi- 
cating with the gun-boat. A speaking-tube 
was run up through one of the air-pipes of 
the crab, which pipe was then elevated 
some distance above the surface. Through 
this the director hailed the other vessel, 
and as the air-pipe was near the stern of 
the crab, and therefore at a distance from 
the only visible portion of the turtle-back 
roof, his voice seemed to come out of the 
depths of the ocean. 

The surrender was accepted, and the 
captain of the gun-boat was ordered to stop 
his engines and prepare to be towed. 
When this order had been given, the crab 
moved round to the bow of the gun-boat, 
and grasping the cut-water with its for- 
ceps, reversed its engines and began to 
back rapidly toward the British fleet, 
taking with it the captured vessel as a 
protection against torpedoes while in tran- 
sit. 

The crab slowed up not far from one 
of the foremost of the British ships, and 
coming round to the quarter of the gun- 
boat, the astonished captain of that vessel 
was informed, through the speaking-tube. 


150 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

that if he would give his parole to keep 
out of this fight, he would be allowed to 
proceed to his anchorage in Portsmouth 
harbour. The parole was given, and the 
dynamite gun-boat, after reporting to the 
flag-ship, steamed away to Portsmouth. 

The situation now became one which 
was unparalleled in the history of naval 
warfare. On the side of the British, seven 
war-ships were disabled and drifting slowly 
to the south-east. For half an hour no ad- 
vance had been made by the British fleet, 
for whenever one of the large vessels had 
steamed ahead, such vessel had become the 
victim of a crab, and the Vice-Admiral 
commanding the fleet had signalled not to 
advance until further orders. 

The crabs were also lying-to, each to the 
windward of, and not far from, one of the 
British ships. They had ceased to make 
any attacks, and were resting quietly under 
protection of the enemy. Tliis, with the 
fact that the repeller still lay four miles 
away, without any apparent intention of 
taking part in the battle, gave the situa- 
tion its peculiar character. 

The British Vice-Admiral did not intend 
to remain in this quiescent condition. It 
was, of course, useless to order forth his 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 151 

ironclads, sim[)ly to see them disabled and 
set adrift. There was another arm of the 
service which evidently could be used with 
better effect upon this peculiar foe than 
could the great battle-ships. 

But before doing anything else, he must 
provide for the safety of those of his 
vessels which had been rendered helpless 
by the crabs, and some of which were now 
drifting dangerously near to each other. 
Despatches had been sent to Portsmouth 
for tugs, but it would not do to wait until 
these arrived, and a sufficient number of 
ironclads were detailed to tow their in- 
jured consorts into port'. 

When this order had been given, the 
Vice-Admiral immediately prepared to re- 
new the fight, and this time his efforts 
were to be directed entirely against the 
repeller. It would be useless to devote 
any further attention to the crabs, espe- 
cially in their present positions. But if 
the chief vessel of the Syndicate’s fieet, 
with its spring armour and its terrible 
earthquake bombs, could be destroyed, it 
was quite possible that those sea-parasites, 
the crabs, could also be disposed of. 

Every torj)edo-boat was now ordered to 
the front, and in a long line, almost abreast 


152 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

of each other, these swift vessels — the 
light-infantry of the sea — advanced upon 
the solitary and distant foe. If one 
torpedo could but reach her hull, the Vice- 
Admiral, in spite of seven disabled iron- 
clads and a captured gun-boat, might yet 
gaze proudly at his floating flag, even if his 
own ship should be drifting broadside to 
the sea. 

The line of torpedo-boats, slightly curv- 
ing inward, had advanced about a mile, 
when Repeller No. 11 awoke from her 
seeming sleep, and began to act. The two 
great guns at her bow were trained up- 
ward, so that a bomb discharged from them 
would fall into the sea a mile and a half 
ahead. Slowly turning her bow from side 
to side, so that the guns would cover a 
range of nearly half a circle, the instanta- 
neous motor-bombs of the repeller were 
discharged, one every half minute. 

One of the most appalling character- 
istics of the motor-bombs was the silence 
which accompanied their discharge and 
action. No noise was heard, except the 
flash of sound occasioned by the removal 
of the particles of the object aimed at, 
and the subsequent roar of wind or fall of 
water. 


THE GREAT }VAR SYNDICATE. 153 

As each motor-bomb dropped into the 
channel, a dense cloud appeared high in 
the air, above a roaring, seething cauldron, 
hollowed out of the waters and out of 
the very bottom of the channel. Into 
this chasm the cloud quickly came down, 
condensed into a vast body of water, which 
fell, with the roar of a cyclone, into the 
dreadful abyss from which it had been 
torn, before the hissing walls of the great 
hollow had half filled it with their sweep- 
ing surges. The piled-up mass of the 
redundant water was still sending its 
maddened billows tossing and writhing in 
every direction toward their normal level, 
when another bomb was discharged ; 
another surging abyss appeared, another 
roar of wind and water was heard, and 
another mountain of furious billows up- 
lifted itself in a storm of spray and foam, 
raging that it had found its place usurped. 

Slowly turning, the repeller discharged 
bomb after bomb, building up out of the 
very sea itself a barrier against its ene- 
mies. Under these thundering cataracts, 
born in an instant, and coming down all 
at once in a plunging storm; into these 
abysses, witli Avails of Avater and floors 
of cleft and shivered rocks; through this 


154 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 

wide belt of raging turmoil, thrown into 
new frenzy after the discharge of every 
bomb, — no vessel, no torpedo, could pass. 

The air driven off in every direction by 
tremendous and successive concussions 
came rushing back in shrieking gales, 
which tore up the waves into blinding 
foam. For miles in every direction the 
sea swelled and upheaved into great peaked 
waves, the repeller rising upon these almost 
high enough to look down into the awful 
chasms which her bombs were making. 
A torpedo-boat caught in one of the re- 
turning gales was hurled forward almost 
on her beam ends until she was under the 
edge of one of the vast masses of descend- 
ing water. The flood which, from even 
the outer limits of this falling-sea, poured 
upon and into the unlucky vessel nearly 
swamped her, and when she was swept 
back by the rushing waves into less stormy 
waters, her officers and crew leaped into 
their boats and deserted her. By rare 
good-fortune their boats were kept afloat 
in the turbulent sea until they reached 
the nearest torpedo-vessel. 

Five minutes afterward a small but 
carefully aimed motor-bomb struck the 
nearly swamped vessel, and with the roar 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 155 

of all her own torpedoes she passed into 
nothing. 

The British Vice-Admiral had carefully 
watched the repeller through his glass, and 
he noticed that simultaneously with the 
appearance of the cloud in the air pro- 
duced by the action' of the motor-bombs 
there were two puffs of black smoke from 
the repeller. These were signals to the 
crabs to notify them that a motor-gun had 
been discharged, and thus to provide 
against accidents in case a bomb should 
fail to act. One puff signified that a bomb 
had been discharged to the north ; two, 
that it had gone eastward ; and so on. If, 
therefore, a crab should see a signal of this 
kind, and perceive no signs of the action 
of a bomb, it would be careful not to ap- 
l)roach the repeller from the quarter indi- 
cated. It is true that in case of the failure 
of a bomb to act, another bomb would be 
dropped upon the same spot, but the in- 
structions of the War Syndicate provided 
that every possible precaution should be 
taken against accidents. 

Of course the Vice-Admiral did not 
understand these signals, nor did he know 
that they were signals, but he knew that 
they accompanied the discharge of a motor- 


156 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

gun. Once he noticed that there was a 
short cessation in the hitherto constant 
succession of water avalanches, and dur- 
ing this lull he had seen two puffs from 
the repeller, and the destruction, at the 
same moment, of the deserted torpedo- 
boat. It was, therefore, plain enough to 
him that if a motor-bomb could be placed 
so accurately upon one torpedo-boat, and 
with such terrible result, other bombs 
could quite as easily be discharged upon 
the other torpedo-boats which formed the 
advanced line of the fleet. When the 
barrier of storm and cataract again began 
to stretch itself in front of the repeller, 
he knew that not only was it impossible 
for the torpedo-boats to send their mis- 
sives through this raging turmoil, but 
that each of these vessels was itself in 
danger of instantaneous destruction. 

Unwilling, therefore, to expose his ves- 
sels to profitless danger, the Vice-Admiral 
ordered the torpedo-boats to retire from 
the front, and the whole line of them pro- 
ceeded to a point north of the fleet, where 
they lay to. 

When this had been done, the repeller 
ceased the discharge of bombs; but the 
sea was still heaving and tossing after the 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 157 

storm, when a despatch-boat brought orders 
from the British Admiralty to the flag-ship. 
Communication between the British fleet 
and the shore, and consequently London, 
had been constant, and all that had oc- 
curred had been quickly made known to 
the Admiralty and the Government. The 
orders now received by the Vice-Admiral 
were to the effect that it was considered 
judicious to discontinue the conflict for 
the day, and that he and his whole fleet 
should return to Portsmouth to receive 
further orders. 

In issuing these commands the British 
Government was actuated simply by mo- 
tives of humanity and common sense. 
The British fleet was thoroughly prepared 
for ordinary naval warfare, but an enemy 
had inaugurated another kind of naval 
warfare, for which it was not prepared. 
It was, therefore, decided to withdraw 
the ships until they should be prepared 
for the new kind of warfare. To allow 
ironclad after ironclad to be disabled 
and set adrift, to subject every ship in the 
fleet to the danger of instantaneous de- 
struction, and all this without the possi- 
bility of inflicting injury upon the enemy, 
would not be bravery ; it would be stu- 


158 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

pidity. It was surely possible to devise 
a means for destroying the seven hostile 
ships now in British waters. Until action 
for this end could be taken, it was the 
part of wisdom for the British navy to 
confine itself to the protection of British 
ports. 

When the fleet began to move toward 
the Isle of Wight, the six crabs, which 
had been lying quietly among and under 
the protection of their enemies, withdrew 
southward, and, making a slight circuit, 
joined the repeller. 

Each of the disabled ironclads was 
now in tow of a sister vessel, or of tugs, 
except the “ Llangaron.” This great ship 
had been disabled so early in the contest, 
and her broadside had presented such a 
vast surface to the north-west wind, that 
she had drifted much farther to the south 
than any other vessel. Consequently, 
before the arrival of the tugs which had 
been sent for to tow her into harbour, the 
“ Llangaron ” was well on her way’ across 
the channel. A foggy night came on, 
and the next morning she was ashore on 
the coast of France, with a mile of water 
between her and dry land. Fast-rooted 
in a great sand-bank, she lay week after 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 159 

week, with the storms that came in from 
the Atlantic, and the storms that came in 
from the German Ocean, beating upon her 
tall side of solid iron, with no more effect 
than if it had been a precipice of rock. 
Against waves and winds she formed a 
massive breakwater, with a wide stretch 
of smooth sea between her and the land. 
There she lay, proof against all the artil- 
lery of Europe, and all the artillery of the 
sea and the storm, until a fleet of small 
vessels had taken from her her ponderous 
armament, her coal and stores, and she 
had been lightened enough to float upon 
a high tide, and to follow three tugs to 
Portsmouth. 

When night came on, Repeller No. 11 
arid the crabs dropped down with the 
tide, and lay to some miles west of the 
scene of battle. The fog shut them in 
fairly well, but, fearful that torpedoes 
might be sent out against them, they 
showed no lights. There was little dan- 
ger of collision with passing merchantmen, 
for the English Channel, at present, was 
deserted by this class of vessels. 

The next morning the repeller, preceded 
by two crabs, bearing between them a 
submerged net similar to that used at the 


160 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

Canadian port, appeared off the eastern 
end of the Isle of Wight. The anchors 
of the net were dropped, and behind it 
the repeller took her place, and shortly 
afterward she sent a flag-of-truce boat to 
Portsmouth harbour. This boat carried 
a note from the American War Syndicate 
to the British Government. 

In this note it was stated that it was 
now the intention of the Syndicate to 
utterly destroy, by means of the instan- 
taneous motor, a fortified post upon the 
British coast. As this would be done 
solely for the purpose of demonstrating the 
irresistible destructive power of the motor- 
bombs, it was immaterial to the Syndicate 
what fortified post should be destroyed, 
provided it should answer the re'][uire- 
ments of the proposed demonstration. 
Consequently the British Government 
was offered the opportunity of naming the 
fortified place which should be destroyed. 
If said Government should decline to do 
this, or delay the selection for twenty- 
four hours, the Syndicate would itself de- 
cide upon the place to be operated upon. 

Every one in every branch of the 
•British Government, and, in fact, nearly 
every thinking person in the British 


THE GREAT ir.li? SYNDICATE. 161 


islands,’ had been racking liis brains, or 
her brains, that night, over the astounding 
situation ; and the note of the Syndicate 
only added to the perturbation of the 
Government. There was a strong feel- 
ing in official circles tliat the insolent 
little enemy must be crushed, if the whole 
British navy should have to rush upon 
it, and all sink together in a common 
grave. 

But there were cooler and more pru- 
dent brains at the head of affairs ; and 
these had already decided that the con- 
test between the old engines of war and 
the new ones was entirely one-sided. 
The instincts of good government dic- 
tated to them that they should be ex- 
tremely wary and circumspect during the 
further continuance of this unexampled 
war. Therefore, when the note of the 
Syndicate was considered, it was agreed 
that the time had come when good states- 
manship and wise diplomacy would be 
more valuable to the nation than torpe- 
does, armoured ships, or heavy guns. 

There was not the slightest doubt that 
the country would disagree with the 
Government, but on the latter lay the 
responsibility of the country’s safety. 


162 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


There was nothing, in the opinion of the 
ablest naval officers, to prevent the Syndi- 
cate’s fleet from coming up the Thames. 
Instantaneous motor-bombs could sweep 
away all forts and citadels, and explode 
and destroy all torpedo defences, and Lon- 
don might lie under the guns of the re- 
peller. 

In consequence of this view of the 
state of affairs, an answer was sent to the 
Syndicate’s note, asking that further 
time be given for the consideration of 
the situation, and suggesting that an ex- 
hibition of the power of the motor-bomb 
was not necessary, as sufficient proof of 
this had been given in the destruction 
of the Canadian forts, the annihilation 
of the “ Craglevin,” and the extraordinary 
results of the discharge of said bombs on 
the preceding day. 

To this a reply was sent from the office 
of the Syndicate in New York, by means 
of a cable boat from the French coast, 
that on no account could their purpose 
be altered or their propositions modified. 
Although the British Government might 
be convinced of the power of the Syndi- 
cate’s motor-bombs, it was not the case 
with the British people, for it was yet 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 163 

popularly disbelieved that motor-bombs 
existed. This disbelief the Syndicate 
was determined to overcome, not only for 
the furtherance of its own purposes, but 
to prevent the downfall of the present 
British Ministry, and a probable radical 
change in the Government. That such a 
political revolution, as undesirable to the 
Syndicate as to cool-headed and sensible 
Englishmen, was imminent, there could 
be no doubt. The growing feeling of 
disaffection, almost amounting to disloy- 
alty, not only in the opposition party, 
but among those who had hitherto been 
firm adherents of the Goyernment, was 
mainly based upon the idea that the 
present British rulers had allowed them- 
selves to be frightened by mines and tor- 
pedoes, artfully placed and exploded. 
Therefore the Syndicate intended to set 
right the public mind upon this subject. 
The note concluded by earnestly urging 
the designation, without loss of time, of a 
place of operations. 

This answer was received in London in 
the evening, and all night it was the sub- 
ject of earnest and anxious deliberation in 
the Government offices. It was at last de- 
cided, amid great opposition, that the Syn- 


164 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


dicate’s alternative must be accepted, for 
it would be the height of folly to allow 
the repeller to bombard any port she 
should choose. When this conclusion had 
been reached, the work of selecting a 
place for the proposed demonstration of 
the American Syndicate occupied but 
little time. The task was not difficult. 
Nowhere in Great Britain was there a for- 
tified spot of so little importance as Caer- 
daff, on the west coast of Wales. 

Caerdaff consisted of a large fort on a 
promontory, and an immense castellated 
structure on the other side of a small bay, 
with a little fishing village at the head of 
said bay. The castellated structure was 
rather old, the fortress somewhat less so ; 
and both had long been considered useless, 
as there was no probability that an enemy 
would land at this point on the coast. 

Caerdaff was therefore selected as the 
spot to be operated upon. No one could 
for a moment imagine that the Syndicate 
had mined this place ; and if it should be 
destroyed by motor-bombs, it would prove 
to the country that the Government had 
not been frightened by the tricks of a 
crafty enemy. 

An hour after the receipt of the note in 


Caerdaff before the Bombardment, 


THE GEE AT WAR SYNDICATE, 165 



166 THE GBEAT WAB SY^BIEATE. 

wliich it was stated that Caerdaff had been 
selected, the Syndicate’s fleet started for 
that place. The crabs were elevated to 
cruising height, the repeller taken in tow, 
and by the afternoon of the next day the 
fleet was lying off Caerdaff. A note was 
sent on shore to the officer in command, 
stating that the bombardment would begin 
at ten o’clock in the morning of the next 
day but one, and requesting that informa- 
tion of the hour appointed be instantly 
transmitted to London. When this had 
been done, the fleet steamed six or seven 
miles off shore, where it lay to or cruised 
about for two nights and a day. 

As soon as the Government had selected 
Caerdaff for bombardment, immediate 
measures were taken to remove the small 
garrisons and the inhabitants of the fish- 
ing village from possible danger. When 
the Syndicate’s note was received by the 
commandant of the fort, he was already 
in receipt of orders from the War Office 
to evacuate the fortifications, and to super- 
intend the removal of the fishermen and 
their families to a point of safety farther 
up the coast. 

Caerdaff was a place difficult of access 
by land, the nearest railroad stations being 


THE GBEAT WAB SYNDICATE. 167 

fifteen or twenty miles away ; but on the 
day after the arrival of the Syndicate’s 
fleet in the offing, thousands of people 
made their way to this part of the country, 
anxious to see — if perchance they might 
find an opportunity to safely see — what 
might happen at ten o’clock the next 
morning. Officers of the army and navy. 
Government officials, press correspondents, 
in great numbers, and curious and anxious 
observers of all classes, hastened to the 
Welsh coast. 

The little towns where the visitors left 
the trains were crowded to overflowing, 
and every possible conveyance, by which 
the mountains lying back of Caerdaff 
could be reached, was eagerly secured, 
many persons, however, being obliged to 
depend upon their own legs. Soon after 
sunrise of the appointed day the forts, the 
village, and the surrounding lower country 
were entirely deserted, and every point 
of vantage on the mountains lying some 
miles back from the coast was occupied by 
excited spectators, nearly every one armed 
with a field-glass. 

A few of the guns from the fortifica- 
tions were transported to an overlooking 
height, in order that they might be 


168 THE GEE AT WAB SYNDICATE, 


brought into action in case the repeller, 
instead of bombarding, should send men 
in boats to take possession of the evacu- 
ated fortifications, or should attempt any 
mining operations. The gunners for this 
battery were stationed at a safe place to 
the rear, whence they could readily reach 
their guns if necessary. 

The next day was one of supreme im- 
portance to the Syndicate. On this day 
it must make plain to the world, not 
only what the motor- bomb could do, but 
that the motor-bomb did what was done. 
Before leaving the English Channel the 
director of Repeller No. 11 had received 
telegraphic advices from both Europe and 
America, indicating the general drift of 
public opinion in regard to the recent 
sea-fight; and, besides these, many Eng- 
lish and continental papers Lad been 
brought to him from the French coast. 

From all these the director perceived 
that the cause of the Syndicate had in a 
certain way suffered from the manner in 
which the battle in the channel had been 
conducted. Every newspaper urged that 
if the repeller carried guns capable of 
throwing the bombs which the Syndicate 
professed to use, there was no reason why 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 169 

every ship in the British fleet should not 
have been destroyed. But as the repeller 
had not fired a single shot at the fleet, and 
as the battle had been fought entirely by 
the crabs, there was every reason to be- 
lieve that if there were such things as 
motor-guns, their range was very short, 
not as great as that of the ordinary dyna- 
mite cannon. The great risk run by one 
of the crabs in order to disable a dyna- 
mite gun-boat seemed an additional proof 
of this. 

It was urged that the explosions in the 
water might have been produced by tor- 
pedoes ; that the torpedo-boat which had 
been destroyed was so near the repeller 
that an ordinary shell was sufficient to 
accomplish the damage that had been 
done. 

To gainsay these assumptions was im- 
perative on the Syndicate’s forces. To 
firmly establish the prestige of the instan- 
taneous motor was the object of the war. 
Crabs were of but temporary service. 
Any nation could build vessels like 
them, and there were many means of de- 
stroying them. The spring armour was a 
complete defence against ordinary artil- 
lery, but it was not a defence against 


170 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

submarine torpedoes. The claims of the 
Syndicate could be firmly based on noth- 
ing but the powers of absolute annihi- 
lation possessed by the instantaneous 
motor-bomb. 

About nine o’clock on the appointed 
morning, Repeller No. 11, much to the 
surprise of the spectators on the high 
grounds with field-glasses and telescopes, 
steamed away from Caerdaff. What this 
meant nobody knew, but the naval mili- 
tary observers immediately suspected that 
the Syndicate’s vessel had concentrated at- 
tention upon Caerdaff in order to go over 
to Ireland to do some sort of mischief 
there. It was presumed that the crabs ac- 
companied her, but as they were now at 
their fighting depth it was impossible to 
see them at so great a distance. 

But it was soon perceived that Repeller 
No. 11 had no intention of running away, 
nor of going over to Ireland. From slowly 
cruising about four or five miles off shore, 
she had steamed westward until she had 
reached a point which, according to the 
calculations of her scientific corps, was 
nine marine miles from Caerdaff. There 
she lay to against a strong breeze from 
the east. 


British Officers watching the Effect of the Motor-bombs. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


171 



172 TUE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


It was not yet ten o’clock when the of- 
ficer in charge of the starboard gun re- 
marked to the director that he supposed 
that it would not be necessary to give the 
smoke signals, as had been done in the 
channel, as now all the crabs were lying 
near them. The director reflected a mo- 
ment, and then ordered that the signals 
should be given at every discharge of the 
gun, and that the columns of black smoke 
should be shot up to their greatest height. 

At precisely ten o’clock, up rose from 
Eepeller No. 11 two tall jets of black 
smoke. Up rose from the promontory of 
Caerdaff, a heavy gray cloud, like an im- 
mense balloon, and then the people on the 
hill-tops and highlands felt a sharp shock of 
the ground and rocks beneath them, and 
heard the sound of a terrible but mo- 
mentary grinding crush. 

As the cloud began to settle, it was 
borne out to sea by the wind, and then it 
was revealed that the fortifications of 
Caerdafi had disappeared. 

In ten minutes there was another smoke 
signal, and a great cloud over the castel- 
lated structure on the other side of the 
bay. The cloud passed away, leaving a 
vacant space on the other side of the bay. 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 173 

The second shock sent a panic through 
the crowd of spectators. The next earth- 
quake bomb might strike among them. 
Down the eastern slopes ran hundreds of 
them, leaving only a few of the bravest 
civilians, the reporters of the press, and the 
naval and military men. 

The next motor-bomb descended into 
the fishing village, the comminuted par- 
ticles of which, being mostly of light 
material, floated far out to sea. 

The detachment of artillerists who had 
been deputed to man the guns on the 
heights which commanded the bay had 
been ordered to fall back to the mountains 
as soon as it had been seen that it was not 
the intention of the repeller to send boats 
on shore. The most courageous of the 
spectators trembled a little when the fourth 
bomb was discharged, for it came farther 
inland, and struck the height on which the 
battery had been placed, removing all 
vestiges of the guns, caissons, and the 
ledge of rock on which they had stood. 

The motor-bombs which the repeller 
was now discharging were of the largest 
size and greatest power, and a dozen more 
of them were discharged at intervals of a 
few minutes. . The promontory on which 


174 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


the fortifications had stood was annihi- 
lated, and the Avaters of the bay SAV^ept 
over its foundations. Soon after Avard the 
head of the bay seemed madly rushing out 
to sea, but quickly surged back to fill the 
chasm Avhich yawned at the spot Avhere the 
village had been. 

The dense clouds Avere noAv upheaved at 
such short intervals that the scene of 
devastation Avas completely shut out from 
the obserA^ers on the hills ; but every few 
minutes they felt a sickening shock, and 
heard a momentary and horrible crash and 
hiss which seemed to fill all the air. The in- 
stantaneous motor-bombs Avere tearing up 
the sea-board, and grinding it to atoms. 

It was not yet noon Avhen the bombard- 
ment ceased. No more puffs of black 
smoke came up from the distant repeller, 
and the vast spreading mass of clouds 
moved seaward, dropping down upon St. 
George’s Channel in a rain of stone dust. 
Then the repeller steamed shoreAvard, and 
when she was within three or four miles 
of the coast she ran up a large Avhite flag 
in token that her task Avas ended. 

This sign that the bombardment had 
ceased was accepted in good faith ; and as 
some of the. military and naval men had 


THE GREAT WxiR SYNDICATE. 175 


carefully noted tliat each puff from the 
repeller was accompanied by a shock, it 
was considered certain that all the bombs 
which had been discharged had acted, and 
that, consequently, no further danger was 
to be apprehended from them. In spite of 
this announcement many of the spectators 
would not leave their position on the hills, 



Caerdafp after the Bombardment. 


but a hundred or more of curious and 
courageous men ventured down into the 
plain. 

That part of the sea-coast where Caerdaff 
had been was a new country, about which 
men wandered slowly and cautiously with 
sudden exclamations of amazement and 
awe. There were no longer promontories 
jutting out into the sea ; there were no 
hillocks and rocky terraces rising inland. 
In a vast plain, shaven and shorn down to 


176 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 


a common level of scarred and pallid rock, 
there lay an immense chasm two miles and 
a half long, half a mile wide, and so deep 
that shuddering men could stand and look 
down upon the rent and riven rocks upon 
which had rested that portion of the Welsh 
coast whicli had now blown out to sea. 

An officer of the Royal Engineers stood 
on the seaward edge of this yawning 
abyss ; then he walked over to the almost 
circular body of water which occupied the 
place where the fishing village had been, 
and into which the waters of the bay had 
flowed. When this officer returned to 
London he wrote a report to the effect that 
a ship canal, less than an eighth of a mile 
long, leading from the newly formed lake 
at the head of the bay, would make of 
this chasm, when filled by the sea, the 
finest and most thoroughly protected 
inland basin for ships of all sizes on the 
British coast. But before this report 
received due official consideration the 
idea had been suggested and elaborated 
in a dozen newspapers. 

Accounts and reports of all kinds de- 
scribing the destruction of Caerdaff, and 
of the place in which it had stood, filled 
the newspapers of the world. Photo- 


THE GItEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 177 

graphs and pictures of Caerdaff as it had 
been and as it then was were produced with 
marvellous rapidity, and the earthquake 
bomb of the American War Syndicate was 
the subject of excited conversation in every 
civilized country. 

The British Ministry was now the 
calmest body of men in Europe. The 
great opposition storm had died away, 
the great war storm had ceased, and the 
wisest British statesmen saw the unmis- 
takable path of national policy lying 
plain and open before them. There was 
no longer time for arguments and strug- 
gles with opponents or enemies, internal 
or external. There was even no longer 
time for the discussion of measures. It 
was the time for the adoption of a meas- 
ure which indicated itself, and which did 
not need discussion. 

On the afternoon of the day of the 
bombardment of Caerdaff, Repeller No. 
11, accompanied by her crabs, steamed 
for the English Channel. Two days after- 
ward there lay off the coast at Brighton, 
with a white flag floating high above her, 
the old “ Tallapoosa,” now naval mistress 
of the world. 

Near by lay a cable boat, and constant 


178 THE GREAT ir.lJ? SYNDICATE. 

communication by way of France was 
kept up between the officers of the Ameri- 
can Syndicate and the repeller. In a very 
short time communications were opened 
between the repeller and London. 

When this last step became known to 
the public of America, almost as much 
excited by the recent events as the pub- 
lic of England, a great disturbance arose 
in certain political circles. It was argued 
that the Syndicate had no right to nego- 
tiate in any way with the Government of 
England ; that it had been empowered to 
carry on a war ; and that, if its duties in 
this regard had been satisfactorily executed, 
it must now retire, and alloAV the United 
States Government to attend to its foreign 
relations. 

But the Syndicate was firm. It had 
contracted to bring the war to a satisfac- 
tory conclusion. When it considered that 
this had been done, it would retire and 
allow the American Government, with 
whom the contract had been made, to 
decide whether or not it had been properly 
performed. 

The unmistakable path of national pol- 
icy which had shown itself to the wisest 
British statesmen appeared broader and 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. ITO 

plainer when the overtures of the Ameri- 
can War Syndicate had been received by 
the British Government. The Ministry 
now perceived that the Syndicate had not 
waged war ; it had been simply exhibiting 
the uselessness of war as at present waged. 
Who now could deny that it would be 
folly to oppose the resources of ordinary 
warfare to those of what might be called 
prohibitive Avarfare. 

Another idea arose in the minds of the 
wisest British statesmen. If prohibitive 
warfare were a good thing for America, it 
would be an equally good thing for Eng- 
land. More than that, it would be a 
better thing if only these fwo countries 
possessed the power of waging prohibitive 
warfare. 

In three days a convention of peace 
was concluded between Great Britain and 
the American Syndicate acting for the 
United States, its provisions being made 
subject to such future treaties and alliances 
as the governments of the two nations 
might make with each other. In six days 
after the affair at Caerdaff, a committee of 
the American War Syndicate was in Lon- 
don, making arrangements, under the 
favourable auspices of the British Govern- 


180 THE GEE AT WAE SYNDICATE. 

ment, for the formation of an Anglo- 
American Syndicate of War. 

The Atlantic Ocean now sprang into 
new life. It seemed impossible to imagine 
whence had come the multitude of vessels 
which now steamed and sailed upon its 
surface. Among these, going westward, 
were six crabs, and the spring-armoured 
vessel, once the “ Tallapoosa,” going home 
to a triumphant reception, such as had 
never before been accorded to any vessel, 
whether of war or peace. 

The blockade of the Canadian port, 
which had been, effectively maintained 
without incident, was now raised, and the 
Syndicate’s vessels proceeded to an 
American port. 

The British ironclad, “ Adamant,” at 
the conclusion of peace was still in tow 
of Crab C, and off the coast of Florida. 
A vessel was sent down the coast by the 
Syndicate to notify Crab C of what had 
occurred, and to order it to tow the 
“ Adamant ” to the Bermudas, and there 
deliver her to the British authorities. 
The vessel sent by the Syndicate, which 
was a fast coast-steamer, had scarcely 
hove in sight of the objects of her search 
when she was saluted by a ten-inch shell 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 181 

from the “ Adamant,” followed almost im- 
mediately by two others. The commander 
of the “ Adamant ” had no idea that the 
war w’as at an end, and had never failed, 
during his involuntary cruise, to fire at 
anything which bore the American flag, 
or looked like an American craft. 

Fortunately the coast steamer was not 
struck, and at the top of her speed retired 
to a greater distance, whence the Syndi- 
cate officer on board communicated with 
the crab by smoke signals. , 

During the time in which Crab C had 
had charge of the “ Adamant ” no commu- 
nication had taken place between the two 
vessels. Whenever an air-pipe had been 
elevated for the purpose of using therein 
a speaking-tube, a volley from a machine- 
gun on the “ Adamant ” was poured upon 
it, and after several pipes had been shot 
away the director of the crab ceased his 
efforts to confer with those on the iron- 
clad. It had been necessary to place the 
outlets of the ventilating apparatus of the 
crab under the forward ends of some of 
the upper roof-plates. 

When Crab C had received her orders, 
she put about the prow of the great War- 
ship, and proceeded to tow her north- 


182 TUE GEE AT WAB SYNDICATE. 

eastward, the commander of the “ Ada- 
mant” taking a parting crack with his 
heaviest stern-gun at the vessel which had 
brought the order for his release. 

All the way from the American coast to 
the Bermuda Islands, the great “ Ada- 
mant” blazed, thundered, and roared, not 
only because her commander saw, or 
fancied he saw, an American vessel, but 
to notify all crabs, repellers, and any 
other vile invention of the enemy that 
may have been recently put forth to blem- 
ish the sacred, surface of the sea, that the 
“ Adamant ” still floated, with the heaviest 
coat of mail and the finest and most com- 
plete armament in the world, ready to 
sink anything hostile which came near 
enough — but not too near. 

When the commander found that he 
was bound for the Bermudas, he did not 
understand it, unless, indeed, those islands 
had been captured by the enemy. But 
he did not stop firing. Indeed, should he 
find the Bermudas under the American 
flag, he would fire at that flag and what- 
ever carried it, as long as a shot or a shell 
or a charge of powder remained to him. 

But when he reached British waters, 
and slowly entering St. George’s harbour, 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 18e3 

saw around him the British flag floating 
as proudly as it floated above his own 
great ship, he confessed himself utterly 
bewildered ; but he ordered the men at 
every gun to stand by their piece until he 
was boarded by a boat from the fort, and 
informed of the true state of affairs. 

But even then, when weary Crab C 
raised herself from her fighting depth, and 
steamed to a dock, the commander of the 
“Adamant” could scarcely refrain from 
sending a couple of tons of iron into the 
beastly sea-devil which had had the im- 
pertinence to tow him about against his 
will. 

No time was lost by the respective Gov- 
ernments of Great Britain and the United 
States in ratifying the peace made through 
the Syndicate, and in concluding a military 
and naval alliance, the basis of which 
should be the use by these two nations, 
and by no other nations, of the instanta- 
neous motor. The treaty was made and 
adopted with much more despatch than 
generally accompanies such agreements be- 
tween nations, for both Governments felt 
the importance of placing themselves, with- 
out delay, in that position from which, by 
means of their united control of paramount 


184 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

methods of warfare, they might become 
the arbiters of peace. 

The desire to evolve that power which 
should render opposition useless had long 
led men from one warlike invention to 
another. Every one who had constructed 
a new kind of gun, a new kind of armour, 
or a new explosive, thought that he had 
solved the problem, or was on his way to 
do so. The inventor of the instantaneous 
motor had done it. 

The treaty provided that all subjects 
concerning hostilities between either or 
both of the contracting powers and other 
nations should be referred to a Joint High 
Commission, appointed by the two powers ; 
and if war should be considered necessary, 
it should be prosecuted and conducted by 
the Anglo-American War Syndicate, with- 
in limitations prescribed by the High Com- 
mission. 

The contract made with the new Syndi- 
cate was of the most stringent order, and 
contained every provision that ingenuity 
or foresight of man could invent or sug- 
gest to make it impossible for the Syndi- 
cate to transfer to any other nation the 
use of the instantaneous motor. 

Throughout all classes in sympathy with 


THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 185 

the Administrative parties of Great Brit- 
ain and the United States there was a 
feeling of jubilant elation on account of 
the alliance and the adoption by the two 
nations of the means of prohibitive war- 
fare. This public sentiment acted even 
upon the opposition ; and the majority of 
army and navy officers in the two coun- 
tries felt bound to admit that the arts of 
war in which they had been educated 
were things of the past. Of course there 
were members of the army and navy in 
both countries who deprecated the new 
state of things. But there were also men, 
still living, who deprecated the abolition 
of the old wooden seventy-four gun ship. 

A British artillery officer conversing 
with a member of the American Syndicate 
at a London club, said to liim : — 

“ Do you know that you made a great 
mistake in the beginning of your opera- 
tions with the motor-guns? If you had 
contrived an attachment to the motor 
which should have made an infernal thun- 
der-clap and a storm of smoke at the mo- 
ment of discharge it would have saved 
you a lot of money and time and trouble. 
The work of the motor on the Canadian 
coast was terrible enough, but people could 


18G THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE, 

see no connection between that and the 
guns on your vessels. If you could have 
sooner shown that connection you might 
have saved 3*ourselves the trouble of cross- 
ing the Atlantic. And, to prove this, one 
of the most satisfactory points connected 
with your work on the Welsh coast was 
the jet of smoke which came from the re- 
peller every time she discharged a motor. 
If it had not been for those jets, I believe 
there would be people now in the opposi- 
tion who would swear that Caerdaff had 
been mined, and that the Ministry were a 
party to it.” 

“Your point is well taken,” said the 
American, “and should it ever be neces- 
sary to discharge any more bombs, — which 
I hope it may not be, — we shall take care 
to show a visible and audible connection 
between cause and effect.” 

“ The devil take it, sir ! ” cried an old 
captain of an English ship-of-the-line, who 
was sitting near hj, “ What 3'ou are 
talking about is not war! We might as 
well send out a Codfish Trust to settle 
national disputes. In the next sea-fight 
well save ourselves the trouble of gnaw- 
ing and crunching at the sterns of the 
enemy. Well simply send a note aboard 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 187 


requesting the foreigner to be so good as 
to send us his rudder by bearer, which, if 
properly marked and numbered, will be 
returned to him on the conclusion of 
peace. This would do just as well as 
twisting it off, and save expense. No, sir, 
I will not join you in a julep ! I have 
made no alliance over new-fangled inven- 
tions ! Waiter, fetch me some rum and 
hot water !” 

In the midst of the profound satisfac- 
tion with which the members of the 
American War Syndicate regarded the 
success of their labours, — labours alike 
profitable to themselves and to the re- 
cently contending nations, — and in the 
gratified pride with which they received 
the popular and official congratulations 
which were showered upon them, there 
was but one little cloud, one regret. 

In the course of the great Syndicate 
War a life had been lost. Thomas Hutch- 
ins, while assisting in the loading of coal 
on one of the repellers, was accidentally 
killed by the falling of a derrick. 

The Syndicate gave a generous sum to 
the family of the unfortunate man, and 
throughout the United States the occur- 

O 

reiice occasioned a deep feeling of sym- 


188 THE GBEAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

pathetic regret. A popular subscription 
was started to build a monument to the 



Monument erected to Thomas Hutchins. 


memory of Hutchins, and contributions 
came, not only from all parts of the 
United States, but from many persons in 
Great Britain who wished to assist in the 


THE GBEAT WAli SYNDICATE. 189 

erection of this tribute to the man who 
had fallen in the contest which had been 
of as much benefit to their country as to 
his own. 

Some weeks after the conclusion of the 
treaty, a public question was raised, which 
at first threatened to annoy the American 
Government ; but it proved to be of 
little moment. An anti-Administration 
paper in Peakville, Arkansas, asserted 
that in the whole of the published treaty 
there was not one word in regard to the 
fisheries question, the complications aris- 
ing from which had been the cause of the 
war. Other papers took up the matter, 
and the Government then discovered that 
in drawing up the treaty the fisheries 
business had been entirely overlooked. 
There was a good deal of surprise in 
official circles when this discovery was 
announced ; but as it was considered that 
the fisheries question was one which 
would take care of itself, or be readily 
disposed of in connection with a number 
of other minor points which remained to 
be settled between the two countries, it 
was decided to take no notice of the 
implied charge of neglect, and to let the 
matter drop. And as the opposition party 


190 THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 

took no real interest in the question, but 
little more was said about it. 

Both countries were too well satisfied 
with the general result to waste time or 
discussion over small matters. Great 
Britain had lost some forts and some ships ; 
but these would have been comparatively 
useless in the new system of warfare. On 
the other hand, she had gained, not only 
the incalculable advantage of the alliance, 
but a magnificent and unsurpassed land- 
locked basin on the coast of Wales. 

The United States had been obliged 
to pay an immense sum on account of the 
contract with the War Syndicate, but 
this was considered money so well spent, 
and so much less than an ordinary 
war would have cost, that only the most 
violent anti-Administration journals ever 
alluded to it. 

Reduction of military and naval forces, 
and gradual disarmament, was now the 
policy of the allied nations. Such forces 
and such vessels as might be demanded for 
the future operations of the War Syndi- 
cate were retained. A few field batteries 
of motor-guns were all that would be 
needed on land, and a comparatively 
small number- of armoured ships would 


THE GREAT WAR SYNDICATE. 191 

suffice to carry the motor-guns that would 
be required at sea. 

Now there would be no more mere ex- 
hibitions of the powers of the instanta- 
neous motor-bomb. Hereafter, if battles 
must be fought, they would be battles of 
annihilation. 

This is the history of the Great Syndi- 
cate War. Whether or not the Anglo- 
American Syndicate was ever called upon 
to make war, it is not to be stated here. 
But certain it is that after the formation 
of this Syndicate all the nations of the 
world began to teach English in their 
schools, and the Spirit of Civilization 
raised her head with a confident smile. 


THE END. 


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I 


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“ The work is a great treatise, broad as art itself in scope, 
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profoundest and most admirably balanced.” — N. V. Evening Post. 

The amazing industry and learning of Professor Woltman is all 
his own ; so is his fidelity to history as well as his painstaking con- 
scientiousness, All this combined makes Woltman’s work the best 
manual and the best reference-book on the history of Painting to 
found in the English language. 

WILKINSON (SIR J. GARDNER, D.C.L., 
F.R.S., F.R.G.S. etc.). 

THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE 
ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. A hew edition, 
revised and corrected by Samuel Birch, LL.D., 
D.C.L., Keeper of the Egyptian and Oriental 
Antiquities in the British Museum ; President oi 
the Society of Biblical Archaeology, etc. With 
several hundred illustrations, many of them full- 
page plates in color. In 3 vols., 8vo, cloth, $8.00. 

A new, cheaper, and very handsome edition of WiHcmson’t 
great work. 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD COMPANY, 


LUBKE’S HISTORY OF ART. 

OUTLINES OF THE HISTORY OF ART. A 
new translation from the Seventh German Edi- 
tion. Edited with notes by Clarence Cook, in 
2 vols., royal 8vo, with nearly 600 illustrations. 
Cloth, gilt top, $14.00; half morocco, $19.00; 
half levant, $22.50. 

Student’s edition, complete. Two vols., 8vo, half 
roan, $7.50 ; half morocco, $12.50. 

“ In the new interest in art, awakened in this country, these 
volumes ought to be the primer of our artists and art admirers. 
There is no other work of equal value accessible to the reader, and the 
numerous illustrations make it easy to grasp the principles, and fol- 
i low the development of the branches of art, architecture, sculpture, 
and painting.” — New York Independeiit, 

“ The great success of his book in Europe is partly due to the 
fact that it is the only one of its kind from which .those who aim at 
general culture can obtain a sutBcient idea of one of the broadest 
fields of human activity, concerning which everyone nowadays is 
expected to know something.” — Charles C. Perkins. 

An accepted standard of information, . . . astonishingly 

full, without reaching proportions which might make it generally 
impractical ; scrupulously exact, and illustrated with a rare instinct 
of selection.” — N. Y. Tfibune. 


HE FOREST (JULIA B.). 

A SHORT HISTORY OF ART. Octavo, with 
' 253 illustrations, numerous charts, a full index 

‘ giving the pronunciation of the proper names 
by phonetic spelling, and a glossary. $2.00. 

” It is a library of art histories crystallized into a most useful 
hand-book. The author has made by far the best text-book for 
'beginners in art history that has yet appeared. The book is clear and 
vigorous in style, and written with a firmness that comes of sure 
'knowledge.”— World. 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD b* COMPANY, 


MITCHELL’S HISTORY OF SCULPTURE. 

A HISTORY OF ANCIENT SCULPTURE. 
Imperial 8vo, by Lucy M. Mitchell. With 295 
wood-engravings in the text by some of the 
most skilled artists of this country and Europe, 
and 6 full-page photogravures prepared by 
Frisch, of Berlin. Elegantly printed, bound in 
cloth, gilt tops, $12.50; half morocco, $18.00; 
full morocco, $20.00. 

Student’s Edition. Printed from the same plates 
with all the wood engravings. 2 vols., half 
roan, $7.50 ; half morocco, $12.50. 

SELECTIONS FROM ANCIENT SCULP- 
TURE. 20 heliotype plates, printed in Berhn 
in the highest style of the art from original 
negatives taken expressly for Mrs. Mitchell, 
and intended to accompany her book. With 
descriptive text. In portfolio. Folio, $4.00. 

“Our author has brought to her stately task a thorough under- 
standing of her subject, an exquisite modesty, and long years of 
thoughtful travel in lands where art was cradled and where its 
greatest glories were achieved .” — Chicago Tribune, 

“One of the most valuable contributions so far made to the 
history of art. Mrs. Mitchell treats of the productions of the sculp- 
tor’s chisel in connection with all the different phases of life — 
religious, political, social, and aesthetic — to whose service they were 
devoted. Much light is thrown upon ancient art by a study of the 
institutions and history of the ancient peoples, and conversely, the 
study of all art-products enables us to reach a better understanding 
of the life and times of the people among whom they originated. 
The work will at once be accorded a place among the classics in art 
literature.” — N, Y. World. 


PROF. JAMES FERGUSSON. 

A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE IN ALL 
COUNTRIES, from the earliest times to the 
present day. Uniform with Liibke’s History 
of Art. 2 vols*, 8vo, with 1015 illustrations, 
half roan, $7.50; half morocco, $12.50. A 

Fergusson’s great work is in this handsome, though inexpensive 
edition, made accessible to art students to whom it is an acknowl- 
edged necessity. 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD (Sr* COMPANY. 


By EDWARD and GEORGE CARY 
EGGLESTON. 

FAMOUS AMERICAN INDIANS. A series 
illustrative of Early American History. Each 
in one handsome volume, illustrated with maps 
and engravings. Uniformly bound. i2mo, 
cloth, per volume, $i.oo. 

TECUMSEH AND THE SHAWNEE PROPHET. By 
Edward Eggleston and Lillie Eggleston Seelye. 

RED EAGLE. By George Cary Eggleston. 

POCAHONTAS. By Edward Eggleston and Mrs. Seelye. 
BRANDT AND RED JACKET. By the same. 
MONTEZUMA. By the same. 

These books deal with the most romantic period of American 
history. Tecumseh, the greatest of the Shawnees, was perhaps the 
greatest genius of his race known in the annals of our country. The 
Life of Red Eagle throws light on the Creek War, which broke out 
in Alabama in 1S13, and was finally brought to an end by the 
bloody battle of Tohopeka, fought by Jackson in 1814. 

In “Montezuma” the authors have told the ever-interesting 
story of the Aztecs and their last emperors in language at once simple 
and attractive. In “Brandt and Red Jacket” we have again the 
thrilling accounts of the struggles of our forefathers in the Middle 
States, while Pocahontas takes us to the first settlement of the Old 
Dominion. 


By KIRKE MUNROE. 

THE GOLDEN DAYS OF ’49. A Tale of the 
California Diggings. By Kirke Munroe, author 
of ‘‘The Flamingo Feather,” “Wakulla,’' 
“ Derrick Sterling.” With 10 full-page illus- 
trations by W. C. Jackson. 8vo, cloth, $2.25. 

“ A book fascinating from beginning to end. It tells in vigorous 
English, but without exaggeration, the story of a successful search for 
a mysterious ‘Golden Valley.’ It is one of the most entertaining 
and creditable of holiday books.” — N. V. Tribune. 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD ^ COMPANY, 


I By Prof. ALFRED J. CHURCH. 

K Each I vol., i2mo. Illustrated with about 20 
I plates, many in color, from designs by Flax- 
I man and others. Cloth, per vol., $1.50. 

I STORIES FROM HOMER. 

^ STORIES FROM VIRGIL. 

I STORIES FROM THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS. 
m STORIES FROM LIVY. 

I ROMAN LIFE IN THE DAYS OF CICERO. 

STORIES OF THE PERSIAN WAR FROM HERODO- 
TUS. 

STORIES FROM HERODOTUS. 

TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO; OR, THE ADVEN- 
TURES OF A ROMAN BOY. 

’ STORIES OF THE MAGICIANS. 

WITH THE KING AT OXFORD. 

THE CHANTRY PRIEST OF BARNET. 

“Alfred J. Church has done for the classics what Charles and 
Mary Lamb did for Shakespeare, and what the former proposed to 
' do at one time for Beaumont and Fletcher.” — Mai/ and Express. 

. “ They are well done, open the way well to classic study, are 

full of interest on their own account. Excepting the Bible, nothing 
is better, if anything is so good. These stories have, too, this ad- 
vantage over the ordinary moralizing didactics, that they are strong 
and manly and exhibit virtue in a large, noble, and imposing light, 
not shining in holiness, perhaps, but free from littleness and man- 
[ nerism.” — Independent. 

[ HISTORIES OF THE OLD WORLD. A Se- 
f. ries of Popular Histories. Each i vol., 8vo, 
with frontispiece. Cloth, extra, per vol., $1.50. 
ITALY. TURKEY. By Edson L. Clarke. 


RUSSIA. 

AUSTRIA 

PRUSSIA 



John S. C. Abbott. EGYPT. By J. C. McCoAN. 

GERMANY. By Baring Goulu 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD COMPANY. 


By F. 11 . GOULDING. 

THE YOUNG MAROONERS. With introduc- 
tion by Joel Chandler Harris (Uncle Remus), 
with 8 double-page illustrations. i2mo, cloth, 
$1.25. 

MAROONER’S ISLAND. With six double-page 
illustrations by W. C. Jackson. Uniform with 
“ The Young Marooners/' i2mD, cloth, $1.25. 

THE WOODRUFF STORIES. Sapelo— Nar 

cooche — Saloquah. A new edition of these 

entertaining stories. With six illustrations by 
W. C. Jackson, i vol., i2mo, cloth, $1.25. 

“ It has been written with truth that the ‘ Young Marooners ’ is 
known in many lands and languages. It has become a permanency 
— a classic so to speak. It is vigorous, interesting, suggestive. 
Every boy and girl will thank you for a copy.” — Item, Philadelphia. 


NOVELS BY MARTHA FINLEY. 

Author of The Elsie Books, each i vol, i2mo. 
cloth, $1.25. 

CASELLA. A Tale of the Waldenses. 

OUR FRED ; or. Seminary Life at Thurston. 
OLD-FASHIONED BOY. 

WANTED,' A PEDIGREE. 

THE THORN IN THE NEST. 

SIGNING THE CONTRACT, AND WHAT IT 
COST. 

“This story is original in plan, written in natural tone, at many 
)oints extremely touching, and possessing interests for all those 
eaders who like fiction which develops lessons of a highly spiritual 
Literary World, 


PUB Lie A no NS OF DODD, MEAD COMPANY. 


i 

I 


By MARTHA FINLEY. 

THE ELSIE BOOKS. Per vol., $1.25. 15 vols. 
in a box, i2mo, cloth, $18.75. 


ELSIE DINSMORE. 
ELSIE’S GIRLHOOD. 
ELSIE’S HOLIDAYS AT 
ROSELANDS. 

ELSIE’S WOMANHOOD. 
ELSIE’S MOTHERHOOD. 
ELSIE’S CHILDREN. 
ELSIE’S WIDOWHOOD. 
GRANDMOTHER ELSIE. 


ELSIE’S NEW RELATIONS. 
ELSIE AT NANTUCKET. 
THE TWO ELSIES. 

ELSIE’S KITH AND KIN. 
ELSIE’S FRIENDS AT 
WOODBURN. 

CHRISTMAS WITH GRAND- 
MA ELSIE. 

:LSIE and the RAYMONDS. 


“The one cause of this author’s popularity among thoughtful 
people is that she never neglects to inculcate the doctrines of upright 
living and Christian integrity, and the charming stories of domestic 
life that she has given us are told in so delightful a manner that one 
becomes quite as interested in reading them as the more sensational 
books of the day .” — Detroit Commercial Advertiser. 

The author of the Elsie Books is not a stranger to youthful read- 
ers, especially to the girls, with whom she is a great favorite. Her 
stories are pure and good, and yet full of incident which interests and 
holds the attention, but does not unduly excite, Such books as this 
are healthful in their influence. 


THE MILDRED BOOKS. A Companion Series 


to the Elsie Books, 
box, $7.50. 

MILDRED KEITH. . 
MILDRED AT ROSE- 
LANDS. 

MILDRED’S MARRIED 
LIFE. 


Per vol., $1.25. 6 vols. in 

) 

MILDRED AND ELSIE. ^ / 

MILDRED AT HOME. 
MILDRED’S BOYS AND, 
GIRLS. ' 


“ In a sweet, simple strain the author tells the story of her char- 
acters, their romances, their joys, and their sorrows. Miss Finley 
portrays so beautiful a Christian spirit pervading the households and 
individuals she represents, that religion through them seems very at- 
tractive.” — Christian Observer. 


PUBLTCATTOyS OF DODD, 3/FAD ^ COMPAyV. 


By JOHN S. C. ABBOT, 
AMERICAN PIONEERS AND PATRIOTS. 
A series illustrating the early history and 
settlement cf our country. Each in one vol., 
i2mo, cloth, $1.25. 

COLUMBUS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA. 

DE SOTO, THE DISCOVERER OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 
LA SALLE; HIS DISCOVERIES AND ADVENTURES 
WITH THE INDIANS OF THE NORTHWEST. 
MILES STANDISH, THE CAPTAIN OF THE PILGRIMS. 
CAPTAIN KIDD AND THE EARLY AMERICAN BUC- 
CANEERS. 

PETER STUYVESANT AND THE EARLY SETTLE^ 
MENT OF NEW YORK. 

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN AND THE STRUGGLES OF 
OUR INFANT NATION. 

GEORGE WASHINGTON AND THE REVOLUTIONARY 
WAR. 

DANIEL BOONE AND THE EARLY SETTLEMENT 
OF KENTUCKY. 

KIT CARSON, THE PIONEER OF THE FAR WEST. 
PAUL JONES, THE NAVAL HERO OF THE REVOLU- 
TION. 

DAVID CROCKETT AND EARLY TEXAN HISTORY. 

These attractive volumes, illustrating the early settlement of 
America and abounding with tales of courage and fortitude and 
, thrilling adventures among the savage tribes; are among the best 
books issued. They are written in the clear and picturesque style 
that makes the writer's works on the most interesting periods of 
. F rench history so popular. The story of “ Boone,” always a favorite 
with the young, is retold with singular vividness and freshness. In 
; “ Miles Standish” we have a picture of the hardships of the Pilgrims 
from the parting at Delft Haven to their perils in the wilderness, when 
threatened by famine and surrounded by savage foes. “ De Soto’* 
reads like a romance of the chivalric deeds of knight-errantry. His 
adventures among the Jndlan races, his grand discovery of the 
Mississippi, and his burial in its waters, have never before been told 
'SO clearly, connectedly and circumstantially. 


PUBLICATION'S OF DODD, MEAD 6- COMPANY. 


JOHX S. C. ABBOT. Continued. 

“ Christopher Carson ” is the story of one, of the most famous of 
the Western adventurers whose life is a romance of the wilderness. 

^ “ Peter Stuyvesant ” gives a capital picture of the early history 

^of New York before it passed into the hands of the English, 
r 

fe If a career of daring and successful undertakings, of gallant 
!^conduct in battle, of fearless enterprises at sea, is worthy of record, 

! *the life history of “John Paul Jones” deserves a place in our 
country’s archives. 

The life of “Crockett” is a veritable romance, with the addi- 
tional charm of unquestionable truth. It opens to the reader scenes 
k in the lives of the lowly and a state of semi-civilization of which but 
i few can have any idea. 


The wild and wonderful narrative of “Captain Kidd ” forms a 
story which the imagination of Dickens or Dumas could scarcely 
rival. 


” La Salle” was one of the purest and noblest of the pioneers of 
American civilization, and as such his history should be read and 
understood. 


In “Columbus” we have again the story of the discovery of 
America, while the lives of “Franklin” and “Washington” take 
^ us among the times that tried men’s souls, the dark days of the 
; Revolution and the early years of the United Slates. 


f MINOR WARS OF THE UNITED STATES, 

' A Series of Popular Histories, uniform with the 
Pioneer and Patriot and American Indian 
Series. Each l vol., i2mo, attractively bound 
in cloth. Per vol., $1.25. 

1. THE WAR OF 1812. By Rossiter Johnson. 

2. THE OLD FRENCH WAR. By Rossiter Johnson. 

3. THE WAR WITH MEXICO. By H. O. Ladd. 

4. KING PHILLIP’S WAR. By Richard Markham. 


PUBLICATIONS OF DODD, MEAD COMPANY. 


By WILLIS J. ABBOT. 

BLUE JACKETS OF ’6i. A History of the 
Navy in the Rebellion, for Young People. 4to, 
cloth, with many full-page pictures of great 
interest. A new edition, 4to, cloth, $2.00 

BLUE JACKETS OF 1812. A History of the 
Naval Battles of the Second War with Great 
Britain, to which is prefixed an account of the 
French War of 1798. With 32 illustrations by 
W. C. Jackson, and 50 by H. W. McVickar. 
A new edition. 4to, cloth, $2.00. 

BLUE JACKETS OF 1776. A History for Young 
People, of the Navy in the Time of the War of 
Independence. With 32 full-page illustrations 
by W. C. Jackson. A new edition. 4to, cloth, 
$2.00. 

“The story is pictorially told and well arranged, and the illus- 
trations are a beautiful feature of the book.” — Commercial Advertiser^ 
N. Y. 

“The author shows no partisanship that we can discover, his 
temper is cool and calm, and his style easy, pleasant, and effective. 
It is well done, very well done.” — Literary World. 

BATTLE-FIELDS OF ’61. The initial volume of 
a History of the Land Forces in the War of 
the Rebellion. 4to, cloth, with many illustra- 
tions by W. C. Jackson, $3.00. 

“ Nothing more vital, essential, and desirable than this book 
has appeared in the literature of the war. It is history concentrated 
in its thrilling episodes, its climaxes,”— yi7«r«U!/ of Ednca'ion, Boston. 

“ Mr. Abbot knows how to write for boys; his style is liv< y, 
vigorous and stimulating, with few or no dull spaces. His pages 
teem with picturesque interest, and his picture of each event is a 
capital presentation of the main point, with background so well 
finished that every line of the narrative isJn b M^^ng. In this book 
Mr. Abbot has outdone his awififre^r^ for it is his best.” — The 
Critic, N. Y. • 






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